ZenKimchi Korean Food & Travel
The ZenKimchi Korea Food & Travel Podcast goes beyond the usual travel lists to explore the food, neighborhoods, history, people, and peculiarities that make Korea worth knowing.
Host Joe McPherson, founder of ZenKimchi, has lived in Korea for more than twenty years, writing about its food and culture and creating travel experiences for visitors. Each episode offers practical advice, deeper context, and occasionally inconvenient opinions about Korean food and travel.
Whether you’re planning a trip or simply curious about life beyond the postcards, this is Korea from someone who has watched it change.
ZenKimchi Korean Food & Travel
Gyeonggi Foreigner Problem
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Gyeonggi Province is requiring ALL FOREIGNERS to get COVID-19 tests by March 22nd or face fines. Is this for the public good or security theater? Why all foreigners and why only foreigners? How does this contribute to Korea’s history of labeling foreigners as diseased?
Also…
The LH scandal
The amazing award-winning film “Minari”
--Please Subscribe--
Website: https://seoulpodcast.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/kingsejong
Facebook: https://facebook.com/SeoulPodcast
YouTube: https://youtube.com/zenkimchi
Support us on Patreon to get more goodies
https://patreon.com/seoulpodcast
This is the Soul Podcast. Now in 3D Blu-ray. I am King Seijo, reminding you that you can quickly convert Celsius to Fahrenheit by doubling the temperature and adding 32. And here are your hosts, Emma Kaka, and Joe and Versailles.
SPEAKER_04And welcome to the Soul Podcast. This is Joe.
SPEAKER_07And Emma and Pippen.
SPEAKER_04And Pippin's still there. Thank you for joining us today. It's been a long time, Emma.
SPEAKER_07I know it has been. It has been.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Kind of missed you. Kind of missed you. But the weather's getting warm. Oh God. I'm already doing talking about the weather.
SPEAKER_05Am I doing this?
SPEAKER_04Am I actually doing this? Yeah, so we are back and it the weather is warming up. Coronavirus updates. Coronavirus restrictions have been extended for two more weeks. Extended? Okay.
SPEAKER_07Oh, but they are a little bit relaxed. I think probably from the last time that we spoke. We've kind of just been languishing in this third wave since November. It's just never let up. But for like the last several weeks, we've been going back and forth between 300 300s and 400s with cases.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Um, but they did they're now allowing restaurants, um, bars posing as restaurants, cafes. Uh, they can stay open until 10.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_07Um, I think the the only change that has occurred is that um they're now placing saunas and bathhouse like bathhouses. Um, they're now under the 10 p.m. shutoff restriction, which they weren't before. But now they have to close at 10 p.m.
SPEAKER_04Finally. I mean, though that's where a lot of outbreaks were happening, weren't they?
SPEAKER_07True.
unknownTrue.
SPEAKER_07But yeah, but it's one of those things like they they legally cannot shut them down because there are residents, there's residencies in Korea that don't actually have bathing facilities within the house. So because of that, saunas and cannot shut down because for some people, and it's literally the only way that they can have access to like a bathroom.
SPEAKER_03Wow.
SPEAKER_07Um, like uh, you know, to bathe. Um maybe, and for some places, you know, they probably don't even have like a proper toilet. So that's why saunas, even though they've had several big outbreaks with saunas, they were never able to shut them down because they fall under a sort of necessity um not like guideline, but uh, you know, they're they're necessary.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Oh wow. Okay. Uh I didn't know that one, but yeah, that's I didn't either.
SPEAKER_07Not until um a coworker explained it to me because there was one one day I was just like, but okay, back when again a lot of these um outbreaks were happening at SAS, and I thought like this was just sort of like a a thing people did for fun.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, when you say co-worker, you're you work for a news organization.
SPEAKER_07So someone is Yes, I work for a news uh a Korean coworker who um you know I often turn to when I'm just like, I'm not sure about this thing in Korea. Can you explain it to me? Yeah, which yes, even after 13 years, there's still things that I don't under know or understand. Yeah, you know, always room for improvement and learning, just keep an open mind and all that. Um, but this was something that I didn't know that um in a lot of places, that's why you see a lot of people using saunas, not because they're just going there to relax and do whatever, it's because that is literally the only way that they could get like a bath or a shower.
SPEAKER_04Um so it's literally a public bath. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, it's a that's you know, that's why they call them public baths.
SPEAKER_04Um wow, when the name fits the description. This is interesting.
SPEAKER_06What do you know? They're I get it.
SPEAKER_04So do you think they're gonna close churches at 10 p.m.?
SPEAKER_07Uh I think churches, yeah. Um, I think churches are under whatever guidelines they've been under, like that hasn't changed. Whatever guidelines they've been under for since November, I think they're still under. Um, but the government, they're completely overhauling the level situation. Um, so they announced sort of the like like first draft of this, uh, I think this week.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_07And they're gonna take a couple of weeks to try and fine-tune it and get public consensus on it. But we're going to four levels, and thank God it's one, two, three, four.
SPEAKER_04Oh my goodness, we reduced it.
SPEAKER_07No more of this 1.5, 2.5. It's just one, two, three, four. Um, and they're adjusting, they're gonna the restrictions, business restrictions, and are gonna be clarified. Um, and stop trying to eat the strings on my hoodie. Um the those things, everything's gonna just gonna be hopefully a lot clearer, and I think hopefully a lot more realistic. I mean, considering what we've been going through since November, you know, having to do like with the whole 2.53 thing. Yeah, um, they're being a little bit more realistic. And now that the vaccine program is starting out, and hopefully stop it. Um, hopefully everybody will be, they're hoping for everybody to be vaccinated by I guess like October, early November-ish.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I've been hearing that too. We'll see. We'll see about that.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, but this is Korea. Like, you know, like once they jump bump on jump on something, right? It can happen really fast.
SPEAKER_04That's true.
SPEAKER_07So like they're on board now. Um, I think once we get approval for all the different vaccines, like I'm like, I'm of the mind that they're gonna be able to do that. That's mainly the big thing that we're waiting on. Um, they because they've only approved AstraZeneca and Pfizer at this point.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Um, so they need to approve uh Jansen Johnson and Johnson's vaccine. Um, because they've they purchased from there. They also need to uh Novavax, they need approval. And then what was the other one?
SPEAKER_04We're getting Sputnik.
SPEAKER_07There's one more. No, not Sputnik.
SPEAKER_04Um you said Pfizer, Moderna.
SPEAKER_07Moderna, they haven't, and Moderna, they haven't approved Moderna yet. So but those are all the companies that they've purchased for, and with the purchases that they've made so far, it's more than enough to cover the population.
SPEAKER_05Okay.
SPEAKER_07So and foreigners, um registered foreigners, you know, especially like long-term foreigners, resident foreigners, people who have ARCs, they're gonna be treated just like Koreans.
SPEAKER_04That's good to hear.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, so they um, you know, whenever they open up vaccines to the general public, you know, you can go in and get your vaccine. They're actually gonna do an online um, I think, what's it? Reservation program. Okay. So that you can make a reservation before like your time comes.
SPEAKER_04Oh, good. How many active X controls do I need?
SPEAKER_07Uh all of them, probably. This is Korea. Uh, but you can get online and uh make a reservation in advance to get your vaccines. And the interval between uh will depend on what type of vaccine that you get. Because right now for AstraZeneca, they just changed it from um eight to ten weeks to ten to twelve weeks in between.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_07Uh and that's just because they're trying to get as many people uh vaccinated as possible, like with that first vaccine. Uh but yeah, so right now they're just really trying to speed up the the vaccine program and get as many people vaccinated as possible. I think it was just yes this morning they announced that um people over 65 can be vaccinated with AstraZeneca.
SPEAKER_04I heard that. Well, I heard that from you actually.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, that uh we posted that this morning, so that's happening. Um right now, yeah. Right now they're focusing on trying to get um patients and workers in nursing homes and long-term care facilities vaccinated first.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Um, and then frontline workers have also already received their vaccines. They got the Pfizer vaccine.
SPEAKER_04Okay, good. You actually have real information. I'm serious. Okay, so my my morning routine, I include two Korean newsstream, two, two, two parts of my stream newsstream is from English language Korean news sources. People can figure out which ones I'm talking about.
SPEAKER_07Mine is one.
SPEAKER_04And and one of them is we know is very propagandy, very cheery, does not say anything negative about Korea, and then the other one is actually gives me news I can use.
SPEAKER_07I'm hoping that's mine.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah. I mean, stuff about the LH scandal and stuff like that.
SPEAKER_06They're not mentioning that on the oh that, yeah, that is just oh, it's so much news on the LH scandal. Oh no, no, I'm not confused.
SPEAKER_04I'm I'm I'm yesterday. I'm loving this. I I I just love any real estate speculators to get just boom, boom busted.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, no, actually, like today, because um I I typically leave the office at five, and I literally right before I started packing up my laptop, like they had like a breaking news announcement that somebody involved in the scandal had committed suicide. Oh, and so everybody's like, oh my god. I look over and immediately I'm like laptop shut in my bag, and I'm like, have a good weekend, bye guys.
SPEAKER_04So funny.
SPEAKER_07It's like I'm out, I'm out. I'm out.
SPEAKER_04I don't want to, I don't want to know who, I don't care.
SPEAKER_07You guys have to see your shifts don't end until 7 or 8 p.m. Mine ended exactly 30 seconds ago. I am out.
unknownPeace.
SPEAKER_07Have fun, enjoy your weekend. I'm out.
SPEAKER_04Here we are laughing at suicide. Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_07No, we're not laughing at suicide.
SPEAKER_04No, but I also liked um I was listening to the comments from the um the investigators, the the government officials in charge of investigating and prosecuting. They're just there's they're they're saying they're really just like they're doing like Obama level speeches on these people. It's like well we're going after these these scumbags who have uh uh stolen these people's dreams, who have saved up their whole lives to have a house of their own, and we are going after these people who have stolen their dreams, things like that. Uh just right.
SPEAKER_07Well, I mean they're doing it because the housing market has been one of the biggest issues that people have with the Moon J administration.
SPEAKER_04I have that because well, I mean, yeah. I don't have the issue with the current administration, I just have that issue in general. In general, yeah, waiting for housing prices to cool down a bit.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, and like that's the thing. They've you know, housing prices have just been continually going up, and no matter what they do, nothing really seems to really work. Yeah, so I'm not sure if it's because we're not giving it time to settle in or if they're just really bad ideas.
SPEAKER_04When it comes to real estate, I'm probab not the person to my thing is real estate is slow, and I mean this is a problem that's been up that's been growing for decades. You're not gonna get a quick fix for it.
SPEAKER_07No, there's not gonna be a quick fix. Like, I mean, I could, you know, I've lived here for 13 years and I spent a vast majority of my time living over near Kongguk University, and I moved there at first because I was working in Kung Nam, like near Samsung Station. Yeah, but yeah, Konguk University, that Huayongdong, that area, it was close enough that it wasn't a huge commute, but the housing prices were so much cheaper. Yeah. So for the same price that I was paying for a studio apartment near Sunung Station in Kungnam, I could get like a two-bedroom, large living room, big kitchen apartment in Kyundai for the same price.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07And but then, you know, I lived there for almost 10 years. And so I kind of saw like um the when I finally moved to Kyone Don, like the reason I did was because I couldn't get the same size place for the same size price. Because like within a year, prices had just or no, within two years, prices had just completely shot up.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, they doubled in Anyang. That's why we moved from Anyoung to Gimpo, and now Gimpo's the hotspot, and they're raising in Gimpo.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, and so that's why I ended up moving over to like the I Tawan area because it was a place where I could find, you know, a place I could find an apartment where I could have a bedroom, a living room, and a second room that I could turn into my office, and I could actually afford it. Um, and also, I mean, my key money's actually my key money is really low because I I lost a bunch of my key money, but we're not gonna get into that story because it was a long time ago and it's a long story and has nothing to do with housing prices and everything to do with a roommate that was like, Yes, I'm gonna stay here for two years and then left after six months.
SPEAKER_03Oh boy.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. Um, but you know, housing, yeah, housing prices have just not been cooling down. And like the Munjian administration is like, okay, we're gonna try this, we're gonna try that. And nothing was working. Again, I'm not sure if it's because because like they didn't really give much time to see if it would work.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07I think possibly. Um, and they're just desperate to do something.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Um, so a few months ago, last month, they actually announced this huge uh public housing redevelopment um plan that spans the entire country. And so like uh a few hundred thousand, they're gonna build a few hundred thousand new houses that are gonna be constituted as like public housing, and they're gonna be uh priced lower so that new families or even young people can be able to afford them.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, Jukong.
SPEAKER_07And that's how this whole LH thing started. Yeah, because two of the cities that are gonna are part of this program are Guangg and uh Xing.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. Which is where so they announced it, and then it came out that there were these people who worked at LH, which for people who don't know, that's the um kind of like the state-run housing development company. It's massive. There's so many employees there, like over 20 something thousand people work for them. Um, but yeah, they're kind of, I guess they're in charge of this. Like they're a public housing development company, and these people that worked for them, it came out that just before between I think a a year or a year or two before they announced this, yeah, or just before, just before enough before that it was suspect, they had bought up um like 10 billion won in land in these two cities that were part of this new development program. Yeah, and so red flags immediately are so they announced the program and then they were like, wait a minute. I'm not even sure who broke this. I don't even know who found it out. I just know that it came out recently that you know these 13 people who work for the company.
SPEAKER_04It was 20 now.
SPEAKER_07It is 20 now in the beginning, and at first it was only 13, but then they launched um an interagency investigation, which is um, I think it was like police, it's the police, the new um national headquarters of investigation under the police, which is like the new program uh that they created to give the police more investigative power. Uh, but also uh the who testing my memory, I know this. Um the uh insurance agency was the service was also involved, the financial cuss uh commission, the financial commission one was also involved, and there were two other government agencies that were involved that were just doing a broad looking into all of the employees that worked not only at LH, but also that worked in the land ministry as well. And then that's when they found seven more people who they suspect of also um having taking part in land speculation. Man, so now and that's what creates the 20. So now it's 20. They've done this, they did this big like broad preliminary investigation and uncovered more people, so now it's at 20.
SPEAKER_04Um, taking all the boxes out, yeah.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, and they're gonna do a deep dive into their family as well. So like reports that we were getting today are saying like this is probably just the tip of the iceberg.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, because I'm sure that they would have told family members, yeah.
SPEAKER_07Yep, and that's the big deal. Like they buy up this land using um insider information.
SPEAKER_04Well, it's it's the two things that we're really sensitive about traditionally and really recently. It's education and land and real estate. Education and housing. Anyone that is getting a free ride or is cheating in any way, that is one quick way to get the public ire.
SPEAKER_07Right. And then anybody who's buying up land using insider information is also now on a blacklist.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07I mean, yeah, and like considering just how difficult it is, even for you know, two income families to buy property.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it is.
SPEAKER_07It's ridiculous.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04I mean, it's ridiculous. I mean, it's it's tough. And I got friends who kind of were pressured into uh buying their places and uh they're really having a rough time hitting their mortgage payments. It's really tough.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I mean, like, you know, I'm I'm a millennial, so if I were back in America, I can't buy a place. But definitely here in Korea, like Korea is even more expensive than that. And like I'm from Oklahoma. I'm from Oklahoma, so like that's gonna be like a massive gap. I think like a more comparable gap is probably like buying property in New York City. Yeah, maybe um, so I for me it's like I can't really because I have this massive gap because I know property prices in Oklahoma, at least you know, back in like 2007.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Um but yeah, like I mean, my parents built a brand new 24 square house uh square foot house in 1996 for a hundred thousand dollars.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07And then they sold it in 2004 for 180,000. And this is set on like two acres of land as well. So, like, that's that's the prices that I know and that I'm used to. And then coming here and finding out like if you want to buy like just a decent size three-bedroom apartment, it's gonna be like a million or two million dollars.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it was close from $500,000. Uh, our previous place, they were going to sell it to us for cheap. It was around $500,000 for it was a three-bedroom.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, buying a buying property in Korea is just not an option for me at all. I'm just like looking to find a place that I can rent that will let me stay here for longer than two years. And I found one and I'm not moving.
SPEAKER_04That's hope.
SPEAKER_07Because I hate moving. I hate moving, I can deal with all the little breakdowns. It's an older apartment, but that's what you get when you want a cheaper, cheaper rent in a bigger place.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's true. At least you're not in a basement.
SPEAKER_07And I'm willing to deal with that, just not to have to go through the suffering of moving moving again.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07And it's just me.
SPEAKER_04So yeah. So Uh the latest thing this week that is in the foreigner community, but not talked about much in the Korean press, especially especially in the Korean Korean press, but not even much in the English language press, is that the Yungi government has recently required all foreigners to get coronavirus tests. And this is hold on, let me pull up my notes on this one. Yeah. Um so what happened was uh I think in late February or early March that we've had a few clusters at some factory dormitories in Gyeonggi province.
SPEAKER_05Right.
SPEAKER_04Nam Yangju, I think was one of them, which is in the east, far east of Gyeonggi Do. Then there's one in the north. Uh not We Jungbu, but somewhere around there, I think it was. And those what what they had in common was that they were um factories that had a lot of migrant workers where they were living in together in dormitories, which is a concern. It is a concern. We've talked a lot about uh the bad uh environments the uh a lot of these workers are in. And so Jungi government says we gotta do something about this, about these outbreaks. So let's just test all foreigners in our province.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, like I remember when the story first broke out, um they were doing um an over an overall inspection on factories, um, especially factories that had dormitories. Um which most factories that have dormitories, they have them for migrant workers.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07And and so this whole all these outbreaks were happening, not really because of the fault of these workers, it was because the companies themselves were not following COVID guidelines within their dormitories. And you know, when you pack 20 people in a room that's supposed that usually is probably only supposed to have like 15 or 10 to 15. Yeah, and then considering in COVID time you're it's supposed to be even less, yeah, you know, it's no surprise that clusters are gonna happen. And so, like one of the the main clusters that launched into this, um, yeah, most of the people who had tested positive were these foreign workers, but also there were Korean workers who were also living in the dormitories who also tested positive.
SPEAKER_03Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_07And so it started out that they were gonna, okay, we're gonna test um all these foreign workers that worked at these factories who are living in dormitories, and then that somehow morphed into we're gonna test all foreign workers in Yongi province. And I'm not quite sure how they made that leap, but how had that logic?
SPEAKER_04This is Korea and this is what I wanted to know. I couldn't find any information. Are they testing all the Korean workers in these factories?
SPEAKER_07Um, in the beginning, I was under the impression from what I read that they were testing nope.
SPEAKER_04They should uh that they were they would do the other places, right?
SPEAKER_07Like they were testing everybody at the factories, specifically focusing on people who lived in the dormitories, whether they were foreign or Korean. Um but now I somehow it's kind of morphed into we're gonna test all foreign workers.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Which I'm like, okay.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I'm trying to figure out.
SPEAKER_07But they're still also, yeah, they're still also doing um an inspection of all these factories that hire foreign workers as well. Well, that's good. So yeah, I mean, because that they should, uh, because I'm pretty sure these companies are cutting corners and not following um COVID guidelines when it comes to their dormitories, which we know, okay, stop it. Yeah, I'm gonna put you outside of the office if you keep doing that, dude.
SPEAKER_04Um, but that's a big the tough part, has been all this bad communication. We're all getting it from hearsay. Um they're supposed to be informing the employers that they're supposed to inform their employees about this.
SPEAKER_07Right. The news articles that I've read have said that they were um informing employers, and employers were supposed to inform their employees if they need to get tested.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_07Um, which you under that sort of if that's coming from the government. So in that case, if you're a foreign worker and you don't get informed that you need to be tested, A, if it's incorrect, it's not on you. Yeah, it shouldn't be at least. And B, I mean, maybe there are some sort of guidelines for which foreign workers are getting tested. I don't know.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I don't live in we haven't heard any. Now I live in Gyeonggi province, but I don't work in Gyeonggi province. And so we called this morning the Gyeonggi Province Call Center, which is at 031120. Uh there's also a Ministry of Justice Immigration Contact Center at 1345. Uh call called it and uh asked if I needed to go, and they said no.
SPEAKER_07Um even though you lived in Gyeungi.
SPEAKER_04I live in Gyeonggi, but I don't work, I work in Seoul.
SPEAKER_07Okay, so it could just be foreigners who work in Gyungi.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, but you have the people all the way around, people who live in Seoul but work in Gyeonggi. Uh also we but first we called our local offices, our our uh Donggu office, and they they didn't even they never even heard about this.
SPEAKER_07They had no idea.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Because communication not to forte. Clear lines of communication, not not big. Not big.
SPEAKER_07Not usual, not usually.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, so we didn't know. Um yeah, I have a big problem that that the the employers it's the employer's responsibility to inform their employees, but the emp the employees get fined if they don't get their tests.
SPEAKER_07Right, that's what I heard.
SPEAKER_04There are some levels of abuse right here because you know, when you get your COVID test, you're supposed to quarantine yourself for a amount of time.
SPEAKER_07Right, until you get a negative response.
SPEAKER_04Right. I'm pretty sure these uh factories uh they don't want their foreign workers to take time off to go into quarantine.
SPEAKER_06Uh probably not.
SPEAKER_04So one way around it would be well, I won't inform them of this. They'll just keep working. And if they get in trouble, well, I don't get fined. That's their fault.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, so but I mean the government is they've said, I mean, whether or not they're actually doing it is one thing.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, uh, there are a few things on that one.
SPEAKER_07But yeah, yeah, I mean, there but they they have said that they are doing an um an uh inspection on-site inspections of these factories, specifically factories that hire foreign workers with dormitories. So hopefully a good thing that will come out of that is that they will see a the companies are not following COVID guidelines, or the companies will be like, oh crap, they're gonna come look for uh, they're gonna come here and inspect us, and they'll start following COVID guidelines.
SPEAKER_04But do we have anything in place to punish them if they're not following guidelines? That's my I'm wondering that.
SPEAKER_07Um, there should be. I mean, if they're finding people for not getting tested, one would assume that they are also finding companies for not informing people.
SPEAKER_04But you always find that they're always putting the brunt of the fines on the on the most vulnerable population, on the individual.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, this is true. Yeah, one would hope. I mean, if I were a politician, I would not go for the individuals, I would go for the companies.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Because we all know that's where the money is.
SPEAKER_04Um, no, my questions were like you would think, yeah. If they're testing the foreign workers, are they also testing their families? If they're Korean family members. Uh I mean, some people will say that this is for this is for the public health, this is for the public good. And I would say yes. But this sounds more like theater, public health theater than public health fact.
SPEAKER_07Right. You know, by putting on a show for the public saying, hey, look, there was this thing and we're we're taking care of it. Um, but you would think by now that Korea would learn to do more pointed testing. You know, if this cluster started in dormitories at several, not just one, I think it was like two or three maybe factories, then you shouldn't do just like a blanket, let's test all foreigners. You should do uh let's test everybody, foreign or Korean, that works at these factories, specifically people who are living in these dormitories. And then we should also go a step further and take a look at these dormitories. And it's not even just factories that have dormitories, it's big companies like Samsung and LG. They have massive dormitories outside of Seoul where I mean people live when they're doing training, like before they're starting like entry-level positions. Yeah, you know, we need to be looking at this. This is what we need to be looking at. Are they following whatever the COVID guidelines are? If we haven't set guidelines, which, oh my dear God, let's hope they've set something. Um I would assume that they have at this point. We're a year in. They obviously have to have some sort of guideline set for any sort of dormitory situation, whether it's a university. Yes, I know you're making that base. One would that's why I said one would hope. Um, but I mean, you know, like this is a chance where we they need to like go into that and be like, okay, yeah, have we set guidelines? Are these guidelines working? If they're not, let's come up with new guidelines. Let's like be very specific and pointed because we're at that point. Like, we've been in this for a year. You can't just do blanket what have you.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, we have we do have this history of making everything just for show. This goes back a long way. I've been reading up, I've been getting a lot and more Joseph Dynasty history books and stuff. And Joseph Dynasty, this is one reason why. Oh, I want to say this on the dark side of Soul Podcasts. Uh, this is one reason why uh the international community gave up on Korea when Japan was uh being too aggressively taking over. It's like yeah, we were so tired of you doing everything just for show. We gave up on you. Have fun with Japan. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Whatever.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's the history of doing this.
SPEAKER_07Um, and I mean, like even like if you look right, and well, like even if you just look at like the past year and like the COVID history, you know, um, I mean, I know a lot of foreigners feel like they're being you know pointed out right now, but and yes, and again, you know, and we also have like the ET1 cluster, which was dealt with horribly. Yes, but also like I mean, when we were having the call center clusters, yeah, anybody, and this was most this was pretty much all Koreans, mostly Korean workers, you know, they had a cluster that a few call centers had clusters, and then suddenly every call center in the nation is having to go in and get COVID tested. Um, you know, nursing home, they cluster started happening at nursing homes. Everybody who worked at, lived in, visited a nursing home has to get tested.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_04I mean, I'm not trying to like say no, no, no, that this is that's more balanced, that's more nuanced. But they when Young when uh young people were going up to the Youngie Facebook page and asking them, you know, getting on to them about this, in their defense, they're saying, well, we have tested when there's an outbreak at a coupon center, we tested everyone at coupon. Uh when there's an outbreak at a church, we tested everyone at the church. But and that I kind of want to say, but did you test everyone at every church? You know, if you have an outbreak at a sauna, are you testing everyone who ever went to any sauna?
SPEAKER_07Yeah, that's the difference. I mean, I think like the only comparison we make is like the call centers.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, the call centers.
SPEAKER_07Because that is one thing that yeah. One two call centers had clusters, every call center in the nation was being tested.
SPEAKER_04But you could also divide this by visa type as well, because there are people who are on E7 visas, people who are university professors and such that because of restrictions have not even left their apartment. They're doing all their work, all their classes remotely. They've not barely left their apartments. Right. And they're being lunked into the category as people crowded together in dorms.
SPEAKER_07Right, which is not to say anything bad about people crowded into dorms.
SPEAKER_04No, no, no, no. But but it's this blanket of lumping everyone together or painting everyone with the same brush, painting every situation, yeah.
SPEAKER_07No, and I right, and I agree. And that's why I was what I was talking about earlier is like it needs to be more targeted. Um, and this just to me reeks of like just laziness.
SPEAKER_04It's like uh smart smart bomb, not a carpet bomb. And and it's ironic that whenever we bring this up, they keep saying, Well, you should understand our unique situation, but they're not they're not even considering others' unique situations.
SPEAKER_07Exactly, exactly. No, I I agree. I'm just like, and it only is it's you know, because foreigners and migrant workers, they're when it comes to you know, clusters involving Koreans, they're like, okay, only people at call centers, okay, only people at this church. But if there's a cluster that it seems like if there's a cluster that involves foreigners, they're just like, well, uh, this is too much for us to think about let all foreigners.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's what it sounds like. It just sounds like they didn't want to do the work. So it's like, okay, all they're not voting.
SPEAKER_07Okay, maybe this is we should actually like look into how these factories are handling COVID because they're obviously not following guidelines in some way.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, they obviously aren't. Uh this reminds me a lot, and then it sounds like they're just doing this for show still a bit. I mean uh this reminds me a lot of I think it was 2007. I want to say 2006, 2007. We had uh some fake degree scandals in the ESL community. Uh a coup, I think a couple a couple of teachers were caught faking their diplomas.
SPEAKER_07I think that was that was uh because I was here, so I want to say that was probably 2008. It was either late 2007 or definitely 2008.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and the first quick fix they had was for every single teacher, every single foreign teacher in Korea to go to their local immigration, to take a day off of work, go all the way down to their local immigration office. And I say local, I say local facetiously. Most people go into the for their immigration office. It's a long, long ride to get there. And they get there, and what do they do? They have to give the immigration office the phone number for the university they graduated from. Nothing else. The phone number. I'm like, why?
SPEAKER_07Don't they already have that on file?
SPEAKER_04A, don't they already have that? B, are they seriously going to call each university and check up on that? Now they never did anything. This was just for theater. They never, they just inconvenienced all the foreigners to make it sound like that they were doing something.
SPEAKER_07And it would make more sense, like if this was actually like if that was actually an issue, it would make more sense for them, for them to adopt that into the visa approval process, you know.
SPEAKER_04Well, it's now part of the visa approval process. We now have to get the opposite uh transcripts and diplomas and everything. Right.
SPEAKER_07But like, okay, when when I I'm just like, how I'm like, damn, like how could people fake that? Because even I got my E2 in 2007 and I had to submit, yes, like you know, I would submit a photocopy of my um my degree, which okay, I admit, yeah. But I also had to send them sealed two sealed college transcripts.
SPEAKER_04Um okay, so that rule was after the phone number rule. Because the phone number rule was the first band-aid to the solution to this problem.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. So when I applied for my first E2, I had to submit sealed college transcripts, which that those were fun to get.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Um not the easiest thing to get.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, like it took four months in between getting hired for the job until I could actually come to Korea because you know, that's just how long it took to get all the documentation.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07And this is when getting an E2 was easy.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07This was before you had to go in and do an interview, you know, you before you had to get apostles, before you had to have an FBI background check.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07You know, I just had to have these transcripts, which because I had just graduated from university, I had to wait a on my diploma, because they don't give your doesn't when you walk the stage, they don't give you your diploma when you walk the stage, they send it to you weeks later.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07And uh transcripts also had to wait.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07So um, and I had applied and gotten the job a month after I had graduated. So I yeah, it took four months and then like the whole processing and making sure I was who I was and that I graduated and this and that. And then like I had to like FedEx the well, actually, I will say this. This is back in a time where I didn't actually have to go physically to a Korean consulate um to get a visa. I could FedEx everything, including my passport, which was a little not gonna lie, scared the shit out of me.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I agree with that.
SPEAKER_07But but I could but I could FedEx everything to um the closest consulate, which was like a four-hour drive. I was in Florida at the time. Um, so I had to FedEx it to a completely different city, and I can't even imagine like everybody and like after I got here and after everything got harder, where you had to actually go in for an actual interview.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07I'm like, what? Like, because I had friends in Texas who came here to teach English afterwards, and Texas has like one or two consulates, and Texas is a massive, massive, massive state. So they would have to drive like four or five hours to get to the closest Korean consulate to do an interview just to teach English in Korea.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07And this was during like the the flood, the flood of English teachers.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, which we don't we're not getting a trickle now.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, but this is I think out of all well no, Korea is pretty much just trying to kick out all the foreigners they currently have, apparently.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, well, this is what it feels like is out of all weird policies towards foreigners, uh, this is a this is an area where we're we've gotten a little sensitive about lately uh things involving disease. Um, one thing this has also been a series of oopsies, then this has all been the Gyungi government. Because actually the federal government and the Seoul C took Bioshi, the Seoul City, has been pretty good about keeping everything, but it's the Gyeungi government that has been hamming it up the whole time. Starting with a year ago, they were doing a free mass campaign, but except for foreigners. Which they fixed after people protested, and they said, oops, we didn't.
SPEAKER_07But didn't wasn't Gyungi uh one of the first provinces to actually offer COVID relief to foreigners before even sold it.
SPEAKER_04Well, no, let me bring that one up. They they were offering COVID relief, but they were leaving out foreigners until the people protested and they went, they said again, oops, we didn't know.
SPEAKER_07Right. And then the Soul government was like, ah, right.
SPEAKER_04So the soul soul government. Yeah, so gave really payments much after Gyungi. Gyungi was trying to be progressive because the governor plans to run for president. But each time they were doing all these great programs, uh, they kept forgetting to include the foreigners. They like, oh, forgot. Oh, forgot again.
SPEAKER_07Great, sorry.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_04Totally forgotten.
SPEAKER_02And now they're doing it again. Again. You know, they're just like, then now they're still saying, oops, we weren't aware. Oops, we weren't aware.
SPEAKER_07Sorry, we totally forgot you guys lived here.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Or again. We just forget that you're not a monolith.
SPEAKER_07For the sixth time in a year, we totally forgot you guys were here. Sorry.
SPEAKER_04You're all different shapes and sizes, have all different situations.
SPEAKER_07Like uh personally for me, um, when it came to the Seoul Metropolitan, uh, what they offered for foreigners for COVID relief. Yeah, I thought their guidelines were a little too stringent.
SPEAKER_04Oh, they were?
SPEAKER_07Um, I mean, they were as a foreigner, it's um as a single foreigner, you had to have made no more than 1.7 million one a month to receive any sort of COVID help.
SPEAKER_04So you can get shipment one as you can get 100,000.
SPEAKER_07Uh I think it was um four four hundred four hundred thousand.
SPEAKER_04Okay, that's decent. Did you get it in cash or did you get it in special cards?
SPEAKER_07Uh we it would be a cash payment because Seoul doesn't have the special cards that Gyeonggi has, which I think no, this is where Gyeungi is progressive.
SPEAKER_04Gyeungi is very forward-looking in so many ways. And again, confused because we get we get our payments in these special cards that can be used to stimulate the local economy.
SPEAKER_05Gyungi Cash.
SPEAKER_04Gungi Cash, but they can only be used. They can only be used in mom and pop's that aren't corporate grocery stores. The thing is, we it's hard to tell which ones corporate and which ones aren't. You can't tell.
SPEAKER_05Oh, true.
SPEAKER_04Uh, because we also have this weird rule that we've had that again, it's it's all for show, it's not to actually do anything, is we're supposed to close down giant supermarkets uh once a week. Sundays or or one yeah, every once every other week.
SPEAKER_07Right, I forgot it.
SPEAKER_04On every other Sunday or in in Gyongi province, it's every other Wednesday.
SPEAKER_07And um, I can't remember what it is in Seoul, but we have the same Sundays.
SPEAKER_04I'm not sure if it's I think it's Sundays. Every other Sunday in Seoul.
SPEAKER_07Every other Sunday or like one Sunday a month or something like that. Which I haven't been to an actual grocery store in about a year, so I don't know.
SPEAKER_04Well, this is what's so confusing about it. So they close down those stores, which is obvious. Okay, so those are the big supermarkets, but then you go to one of the other supermarkets that don't close every other week, and they're considered too corporate too. So you can't use your your your cash there. Yeah. And then um they gave us uh through the the element to the school system, we got another 40,000 won for yeah, 40,000 won certificate for local food, which is a string of uh farmers co-op grocery stores that are mostly in Gyungi province. We go down the local food.
SPEAKER_05Ooh, I like that idea.
SPEAKER_04I love local food. I love local food, but the thing it's it can be very cheap. The trouble is it's impossible to just spend 40,000 won in one go at local food. There's only so there's only so much butchu you can buy, you know.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. Oh, right, and right, because they have a it's there's a time limit on it, right?
SPEAKER_04There's a certain amount of time that you have to spend. You have to use the entire 40,000 in one go. So you have to fill up. So then you're like forced to buy you're forced to buy perishable items because it's all perishable items. It's stuff that's gonna make it.
SPEAKER_07That are not gonna make it, that you're not gonna eat.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Which it helps no one, because that just increases food waste. And yeah.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, so yeah, we couldn't get it over a space of time. We couldn't, it's a card. You couldn't debit it. No, you couldn't do it. No.
SPEAKER_07And it doesn't roll over.
SPEAKER_04It doesn't roll over. You had we had to spin it all or just give it up. And like, okay, well, here you go. When we got we try to pump it up, we we we really were filling up our cart. It was like 28,000 in our cart. And I love local food. Uh, it gets me.
SPEAKER_07I mean, I am I'm a huge fan of supporting um local markets. Like when I lived in Kundai, and then I think for a few years I I was still living in uh Guangzhengu, but I moved closer to like Gunja station. Yeah, but either way, I lived right by a local kind of street market where I could go by go through and like, but I had to have it was cash. You always had to have cash. Yeah, but it was just like but it was great and I loved it because it was cheaper than the stuff. This is Gyeonggi's solution.
SPEAKER_04This is from Nong Yup, and it's uh they just they just get local farmers and they put them in a proper grocery store and they put their pictures next to the produce. It's I love that place.
SPEAKER_07Oh, we didn't get it. It was just like literally like a street, and like people had rented out little spaces, and they would just like put it out.
SPEAKER_04This took care of it all.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, like produce on meats, and it was cheaper than going to a grocery store. And I actually preferred it um over going to a grocery store because A, it was cheaper, B, I was helping the local traditional market economy, right?
SPEAKER_04And and the produce in many ways, the produce is better depending.
SPEAKER_07And the produce is better. Yeah, um I would try and use it as much as I possibly could because, like when I was living there, you know, there were times when I was not making a huge ton of money. So when it came to buying groceries, I would have to use my American credit card, which I could not use at these stalls because they were cash only.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07This was back in the day when cash only was a thing.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Um, so I would have to go to the the closest supermarket, which was like the GS supermarket, or I think there was like a home plus supermarket when I lived near Gunda.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07And but every chance I got, I was always just like, yep, right there in the traditional market. That now living here in um living in Kyongydan, I don't know, I don't know if there is like a traditional there is.
SPEAKER_04There is like we do have one in Gyeonggidan. I've seen it, I've walked through it a few times, yes.
SPEAKER_07Like we have like small mom and pop supermarkets. Like there's one near my house called Wellbeing Mart.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, but that's not it. Which when I do up a near market, it's just very small.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, like Wellbing Mart is like near my house. That's the one that I go to. It's not a corporate, I don't think.
SPEAKER_04You never know.
SPEAKER_07No, it's a it's it's a small grocery store, and I feel like it's a mom and pop grocery store. So when I absolutely like if I need something right now, I go there. Most of actually nowadays I mostly order online because COVID.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Which COVID has really been great for helping me with my anxiety with crowds because every time I go to large markets, I have super high anxiety when it comes to being in large crowds.
SPEAKER_04I get that too. We picked the wrong cities for this.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_07Well, other things I was not always like that. That's that's my excuse. I wasn't always like this. This was a thing that developed after 2013 for reasons I'm not going to get into, but yeah.
SPEAKER_04Well, I mean, this is uh the the going back to our original topic about why this was an this is an issue with the foreign community, is anything disease-related, they need to realize really we've become really sensitive to anything that implies foreigners have disease, foreigners are dirty because there's been a pattern of doing this. Uh one thing you brought up the Itewan thing last year, last May, uh on Children's Day. Um there was an outbreak in Itawan at clubs. They were frequented. These are clubs that are known to be frequented mostly by Korean nationals, but since it was in Itawan, it was blamed on people were blaming foreigners for it.
SPEAKER_07As far away as Busan, and people were and specifically they were right, and specifically, especially in the Korean press, it was pushed that these were gay clubs.
SPEAKER_04Oh, yeah, and that's which is another big uh stigma on top of stigma on top of stigma.
SPEAKER_07And this is where I think it's part of it. It was like gay and foreigner, yeah, and this is why I really think it's dangerous.
SPEAKER_04It's really dangerous by uh making the disease associated with the other. This is very irresponsible, and it's a habit Korea has done throughout history is to always blame the other for problems. Uh people are always gonna go, well, America does it too. Well, and then yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. That doesn't that does not exclude exclude, that does not excuse Korea. Just because America does it a little bit does not excuse Korea from doing it a lot. Uh Korea is not America's little brother that can do whatever big brother does. It's it's its own entity.
SPEAKER_07And well, and America shouldn't be doing it either.
SPEAKER_04And well, America shouldn't be doing it either, but I don't think that I I love this uh this weakness, this weak excuse of giving Korea an excuse because another another country does it. It's it's what what Korea's power, yeah.
SPEAKER_07No country should be doing it.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's so weak. So but we're not allowed to complain. All the rapists come back. No one's allowed to make the situation better because other countries do it. Uh it's just people just not wanting to face face the mirror. Uh, but we've had this long thing. I mean, we had um 2009. This is this is what this reminds me of is 2009, the H1N1 swine flu uh pandemic that went around. And uh the government did quarantine which never actually really hit yeah, but it didn't actually really hit Korea big. It hit. We had around 100,000 total were infected. Uh I think three people died.
SPEAKER_07But it wasn't Yeah. Yeah, but it wasn't a massive thing in Korea from what I remember.
SPEAKER_04I was working in media back then, but we were we started this whole podcast back then, and we talked to people that were in quarantine. We actually did an episode, an episode with people that were currently in quarantine. And this is this is what got me because this was hardly in the news. Hardly in the news.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I know why, because I was working at Audio Yang TV. That's why I was not.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, okay, go. Yeah. Um so they were just quarantining foreigners coming in from overseas, not Koreans. And the people I were talking to, they were coming in on a school trip, and the Koreans got to go home to their families. Now they did have they did have to quarantine. The families did have the people that the quarantine the Koreans did have to quarantine, but they had they were allowed to quarantine in their apartments. The foreigners had to be in a special dormitory facility. And they were separated. And no, so there were some people there that that were married with children and they were separated from their from their spouses and children in this dormitory. They weren't allowed to go home to their uh to quarantine.
SPEAKER_07Wait, but did they have to pay for it as well?
SPEAKER_04Uh I do not know. I don't think they did. I don't think they did.
SPEAKER_07But okay, well, that's a difference. That is one difference from now.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, there's one difference from now, but but the fact that they were separating only foreigners could quarantine in the dorms, Koreans could quarantine at home. And this was this was starting some more of foreigners dirty, Koreans not as much. Um and then go and uh going back to the AIDS thing, the AIDS uh scapegoating.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, HIV was brought in by foreigners.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, uh and there were articles during the eight eight Olympics uh about how to prevent yourself from getting AIDS from foreigners, and then there was the HIV requirements for E2 visas, or actually for English teachers in general, wasn't it?
SPEAKER_07That was uh uh yeah, it was uh E2E1, which is English professors, I believe.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, right, right, where Angela Vandam uh made a complaint with the UN Human Rights Council and won't be.
SPEAKER_07And that guy that got yeah after years.
SPEAKER_04Years and she had already left.
SPEAKER_07Andrea Vandam.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, Andrea Vandam. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Sorry, I didn't actually know anything. I was just going with you on that. But yeah, I know who you're talking about.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and then just scores and scores of news programs about diseased foreigners. And uh we just just just forgive us if we're a little sensitive. And a little sensitive.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, and that's like not even and it's not even just like an an old thing. Like, you know, those Korean uh in-depth news programs were doing things about diseased foreigners just a couple years ago.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah. And yes, I know people are gonna say, because they've had said it to me, well, you know, it's not as bad as you know, but in America, um, you know, Asians are getting assaulted, which is awful. That is awful.
SPEAKER_07Should not be happening. Yeah, should not be happening.
SPEAKER_04And over here, you have a government systematically discriminating against their foreign community. That's also not good. As that's also not good.
SPEAKER_07Not good.
SPEAKER_04You can't just say foreigners in Korea can't complain.
SPEAKER_07You can also make the argument that America has like systematic against well, it's not just foreigners who are systematics.
SPEAKER_04There are systematic problems in Korea in America. Uh and and and just today, I just heard um Republicans in the House uh talking about the Chinese flu again, and it's like, oh god. I mean, that's awful. But that but a lot of the incidents in America is is scumbag individuals doing this. In Korea, it is the government, the system itself doing this.
SPEAKER_07Which, and I mean, honestly, like the it's not just even foreign others, it's just others, others. You know, the government here they refuse to pass um a what was it, a discrimination law. They refuse to pass it because um they want to include um they want to include, I mean, race is not the problem. It's oh uh, it's a religious right.
SPEAKER_04The religious right is come preventing that because it includes protections for LGBTQ.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_07So I mean, like, yeah, we're talking specifically about foreigners, but the the government systemic stuff in Korea is not just limited to foreigners, it's limited to others in general, whether it's your sexual orientation, transgender, women. Don't get me started on that. Um, yeah, so like we're talking specifically about things that are specifically foreigner because we are foreigners who have lived here for a long time and been dealing with it for a long time.
SPEAKER_04And and we don't get any we don't get a voice here. So yeah, because the only voice we can get is the only voice we can get is doing stuff on YouTube and podcasts and stuff.
SPEAKER_07Um yeah, and I mean like it's not for a lack of trying to get, I mean, you know, I think you have to have uh F5 visa to vote, right?
SPEAKER_04I have an F5 and I do vote. I have voted before and it's cool.
SPEAKER_07For me to get an F5, like the honestly, the easiest way for me the uh and by easy, it's still not incredibly easy. I have to marry a Korean guy.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
unknownYep.
SPEAKER_07I mean, I've just been like trying all these years to get it on my own, and I'm just like, ah, they just keep moving the goalposts on that one. Yeah, moving the goalposts. I was just like, I get there, I'm like, I'm almost there, and then they move it like 10 yards farther, and I'm like, God damn it.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, they don't uh they don't what do I have to do?
SPEAKER_01It's like we want to be a we want to be a global hub, but we don't want the global part of it.
SPEAKER_07And I am a foreigner who lives here, who works in the media industry, who makes like okay, not like I'm not rich, but I make okay money, yeah, and I pay my taxes, and all of my money is spent in Korea. I don't really travel that much, and I'm invested in Korea. I fucking lived here. Oh okay, whatever said that. I've lived here for 13 years, 14 years. I don't want to leave Korea, but you see, but I'm looking because my visa expires.
SPEAKER_04You can't even get a credit card.
SPEAKER_07I still don't have a credit card. Yeah, but that's beside the point. Anyway, the point is is like I have this, you know, three-year visa, and after I renewed it, they completely changed all the rules. And so now I have a little over a year left on this visa, and my options are like at this point, I'm like, okay, do I I'm gonna have to go through all of like jump through like 12 million more hurdles just to keep a visa that I jumped through 12 million hurdles to get to in the first place, or it do I just leave? I mean, I want to stay.
SPEAKER_04Korea just wants the prestige. I wanna stay. It's all for they want it for the image, not for the reality. They don't want they want to be an international hub like Singapore, but without the cultural diversity of Singapore. That's what it wants. Um we're just dealing with this today in my company. Is um right now we have funding in our American side, and we're trying to send it over to the Korean side so we can pay our employees. Every time we send a huge chunk of money over, the bank puts a big stop on it saying, What are you trying to do? It's like you're trying to be a dude.
SPEAKER_07We're trying to bring money into your country.
SPEAKER_04You're trying to be a freaking financial hub, international financial hub, and you you block anytime we bring in fifteen thousand dollars into the country to pay our workers. It's it's it's so annoyingly it's just creates it's not ready in that sense. It just doesn't want it doesn't want to be international, it doesn't want to be a hub. It's not ready to be that way because it's gotta it's gotta give it's gotta give way to the other.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, like the last time I checked on because like I've been thinking, okay, maybe I can try and get the F five because I've been on my F2 visa long enough that I could try and go for the F five. It's hard enough to get the Five, but they still have like this whole you have to make sixty-five million one a year to get the F five. At least that's like last time I checked. I don't know, maybe it's different, but oh man. I mean, I was just like, what foreigner makes what not even foreigners, what person makes 50 okay, shut up. But what normal person makes sixty-five million one a year, which like in USD is probably 50, like 53, yeah, 50 between 50 and 53,000 a year.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. It's hard to do that in Korea as a foreigner.
SPEAKER_07Like not Korean Koreans don't even like normal Koreans don't even usually make that much.
SPEAKER_04It's getting there, it's getting there, but it's really difficult to do that as a foreign because it's it's difficult to get a job. Yeah, and like to be not an English teacher.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. To keep my visa, I have to every time I renew, I have to show them that I make at least 31 million one a year, which for me is not a huge thing because I don't I'm not an English teacher, but it's very dependent on if I they're if I have a full time job. Yeah, which I work in a very niche market, which is how I can get paid more than that.
SPEAKER_04And I
SPEAKER_07But yeah, it also means that there are not always full time jobs open.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07If there's a job open, I can get it like that. If there's not a job open and there's not always jobs open. So yeah, like I have a year and a half and I have some big decisions that I've kind of stressing out about, even though I have a year and a half to make them.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07I'm stressing out about it because I know like it's any either decision that I make, I have to have to make it now because I have to prepare. Whether it's like okay, you know what? I'm just gonna do what I have to do to keep this visa, I have to start right now. If it's okay I'm gonna move to another country, I kind of have to start now.
SPEAKER_04Everything it's gonna drink wine this weekend in Ontario. You know what this is reminding me of Minari. This reminds me of the movie.
SPEAKER_06I still haven't watched it. I still haven't watched it.
SPEAKER_07Wait, is that twice? No, I've heard really, really, really amazing, amazing things about it. And I want to, I the reason why I haven't watched it is just because wait, where is it available?
SPEAKER_04Uh you can rent it on all most many streaming services and I've Google Play and such. Yeah. And and is in it is in Korean page.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, well, because like I've got I true, but I would I would also like the English subtitles.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, you would need the English subtitles. But the Korean they speak is not that difficult, in my opinion.
SPEAKER_07Well, I yeah. True, there's only like two actors that are actually Korean actors, right? Like South Korean actors, sorry. Let me review that.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Uh the whose whose first language is Korean. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Right, yes.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Um to be very clear and specific. The the movie. Oh, there's so much. I'm gonna I'm gonna do one of my giant posts on Zen Kimchi about it uh whenever I can, but it's um you would appreciate that it was filmed in Oklahoma. That's why I brought it up.
SPEAKER_07Arkansas.
SPEAKER_04No, it takes filmed in Oklahoma.
SPEAKER_07They filmed it in Oklahoma. Oh my god, no, because of the states.
SPEAKER_04Like in the Tulsa area.
SPEAKER_07No, I mean, like, I consider both homes. So I already felt a connection to it because it was set in Arkansas.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Um, but now that I know it was actually filmed in Oklahoma, I'm just like double connection. And it really to me felt like the most very nostalgic.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it felt like the most rural parts of Alabama to me. I mean, that that was I grew up in Alabama, but that's not the Alabama I grew up. I grew up I was a suburbanite kid. Um, I didn't get to know that part of Alabama until I was a little hungry. Um, yeah, it's it's well done. I would say pay attention to a lot, there's a lot of symbolism in this movie.
SPEAKER_07Um yeah, I really, really, really want to watch it. Um, I'm assuming uh Apple's got it maybe. Does Amazon Prime have it?
SPEAKER_04Uh yeah, I think they all do. Yeah, I think they do. I'd I okay, yeah.
SPEAKER_07Because I have an account with Amazon Prime too.
SPEAKER_04So check it out.
SPEAKER_07I'll check all of that. Because I mean, if I'm gonna watch it, I would rather honestly, I would I want to pay to watch it. I want to support this movie because I've heard so many good things about it.
SPEAKER_04Um the what I find now when you watch it, think of it this way. Think about it as also a parable of your time in Korea because I saw I did I did empathize a lot with the father, Jason, uh Stephen Yun's character.
SPEAKER_07Uh Steven Yun, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. I I really empathize with him. Uh not sympathize, but I empathize because I felt the same pressures he's felt. Um it's the family being dragged around for him chasing his Pyrrhic dream of starting a farm. Right. And that sounds like me and my my family having to deal with me chasing my dreams, doing podcasting and all this. And and yeah, yeah, and and me and my restaurant. Honestly, I mean problems. Yeah, trying trying to do something other than teach English, uh, which is the or the status quo. Which which is the status quo, and it's the one you can fall, it's the job you can always fall back on, and there and for them, it's chicken sexing, which is not a red tube category. It is it is uh where you take chicks, baby chicks, and you and you have it's really hard to tell what sex they are. So there's a profession, there's actually a job where you separate the males. As I have learned, and the male five baby chicks males go into the furnace. And that's that's another big symbol of the whole movie. And but that's the backup that the wife keeps saying, like, we could always go back to doing this.
SPEAKER_07Well, no, chicken farms are a big thing in Arkansas.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07Tyson is like one of the main, I mean, I mean, I I was born there and I lived there until I was seven, northwest Arkansas. Uh I'm originally from Northwest Arkansas, I was born there, and but my mother's family had lived there for about 20 years before 20, 30 years before I was born.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Um and that area of Arkansas where we're from, that's the southern part of the Ozark Mountains.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07So it's considered Ozark region. But it's a good movie.
SPEAKER_04But my mom's family was actually also uh what I liked about the movie, even though it took place in the South, you expect this, oh, racial tension is gonna be a central thing, central thing. No, it it uh the worst was there were some microaggressions. And I caught them because I'm very aware of microaggressions. Uh I think the average audience member would not catch it.
SPEAKER_07Um but this is it's a mostly auto-bior uh autobiographical.
SPEAKER_04It's sort of loosely it's it's a tribute. He says uh the the director uh uh said it was a tribute to his friends in Arkansas. That's but wait, wasn't it so it wasn't his story specifically, but it sort of was like like the outline is his story, like the the setting, the situation. But he grew up in he grew up in rural Arkansas. Not the plot itself, right?
SPEAKER_07Yeah, right, but the situation being um a first generation Korean family from rural Arkansas in the 1980s.
SPEAKER_04He's basically the little boy in the movie, yeah. And it's so well done. It's so well done.
SPEAKER_07That's why like I really want to watch it because I mean, yeah, I've heard really great things about the movie, the writing, the acting, and then also because you know I'm I'm from Arkansas, not from South.
SPEAKER_04And there's it's a connection, it's a real big connection between Korea and the South. And and uh I liked seeing the immigrant story at a part in a section of the country that is not the usual one. I I like the way you would expect to see it. Well, but but it also it really does make the Americans feel look foreign. Because it's it is Arkansas, it is rural, Arkansas. It it does it but in a and but it's it is in a loving way, it does. It's it's they're just weird. Yeah, makes them look weird. Well, and and it shows it just shows how from a Korean's point of view, how how it is being in America as a foreign country.
SPEAKER_07How strange it can be.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, not not the Eddie Murphy coming to America, I love America thing. It's them more of like, we're just trying to get by because the m the country we came from was a little hard. We're trying to do something different and give our children something a little better. And it's it's it's practical. They're just trying to be practical. Now the father's chasing his dream because he always wanted to own something, not being under anyone's foot and to succeed at something. And that's that's his whole dream is that. And if it's farming, that's it. And he's smart too. I mean he's he's he's in Korea in the this is in the 1980s when there's a big blast of Koreans immigrating to America, and I I think he noticed that the Korean produce is there's not as much Korean produce in the markets, so he's making a farm to build to to grow Korean vegetables for Korean markets, and that's uh that's that's genius, of course. Do that.
SPEAKER_07So his his virginie Yeah.
SPEAKER_04No, it was not that crazy. Um but the the movie is it's no movie doesn't follow a traditional plot structure, so some people are gonna be like kind of lost. If you've watched it reminds me of movies like Lost in Translation, you would not be able to tell me what is the climax of Lost in Translation, what is the denoma, what is the rising action of lost in translation. It's not really there, it's more of a slice of life, it's an abstract ethereal. You you feel it, you're you're being immersed in this world and in the story at this time. And that that's kind of what this movie is. And it's not necessarily told in a chronological well, yeah, it's told in a chronological order, but yeah, but it's it's that's there are character arcs, very subtle, but it's not there's not a point where you're like, oh my god, okay, this is the you know, the this is where we resolve everything. No, well, you things do get resolved, but you figure out that the movie wasn't about what you thought it was about.
SPEAKER_07That's what it's why you need to watch it. I that's what I want to watch it. No, just like hearing you talk about like, oh, the you know, this father who upplants his family and is like taking them on along with him to follow his dream. I mean, it actually really makes me think of my own father in our own small town in in Oklahoma. He had a very, very successful job working for coincidentally a Korean company.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, there you go.
SPEAKER_07He was uh he was a district sales manager for Kia Motors of America, which worked out really well for all of us for years. But his dream, I think maybe this is just like a um universal man dream, or I don't know, a universal dream in general.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it is. Um wanted to own his you you see little things about the characters. Uh, you see how the children speak English m mostly while the parents mostly speak Korean. Um, you see the shoes are different.
SPEAKER_07All about the grandmother.
SPEAKER_04The grandmother wears Korean slippers while the little boy wears cowboy boots. Things like little subtle things like that you catch. Uh uh uh the mother is the mother is extremely religious, and so she's all about faith, and that comes into play as well in many ways. It's you know, you find the little thing that is big about each one, and the grandmother is atheist, very strongly atheist, and trying to crow clash with her daughter.
SPEAKER_07I mean, I didn't know that, but like I the few clips that I have seen, I was just like I latched onto the grandmother character.
SPEAKER_04No, she's like she she steals it. That's my steals it.
SPEAKER_07People are gonna be pissed if she's not I love her, I love her, yeah. And yeah, like like the interactions with her and the little boy, and he's like, You're not like other grandmothers. Yeah, you don't make cookies, and she's just like, Well, it's great.
SPEAKER_04There it's great.
SPEAKER_07Love that. I love that because I connect with her because I'm pretty sure should I ever be a grandmother? That's probably the type of grandmother that I am going to be someday. We're just like, What you want me to make cookies? I don't even make cookies.
SPEAKER_04I'm yeah, she doesn't cook, she watches wrestling all day and plays cards. That's great.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, so anyway, grandmother goals right there.
SPEAKER_04Oh, watch everyone, watch out.
SPEAKER_07I also love her her show.
SPEAKER_04Watch Minarie. Uh it's especially if you have any interest in, I don't know. I mean, I I would say interest in Korea, interest in in the immigrant experience. I just um there's a lot. Uh I th I love it how universal this film is. It is.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, because like I hear you talk about it and like some of the things you talk about, I'm like immediately kind of relating to, even whether it's you know my experience here in Korea, but actually most of it is my experience back home with my family back home. So yes, I know it's supposed to be a movie about the immigrant experience in Arkansas in the South. But I'm just like that's actually what I mean. Yes, there are definitely gonna, I'm I'm sure there are things that they went through because I haven't seen the movie yet, but I'm sure there's a lot of that that is definitely immigrant experience that they only had. Yeah, but a lot of the themes and stuff that you're talking about, I'm like, that's actually a lot of stuff that my family went through being um a lower class family in Arkansas. No, um being in Arkansas, specifically Arkansas, when Oklahoma was a little bit different.
SPEAKER_04And I was that was after mom married dad. Another parallel between the father and a lot of people's experience in Korea is the father's very resistant to local customs. He he really tries to hold on to his Koreanness and he thinks all the locals are crazy wackos, the religious crazy wackos. For one thing, the one thing is the divining. No lie, they probably are using a divining rod to find water, and he's like, Americans are crazy, they're they don't know anything.
SPEAKER_07Wait, what? Dude, I would think that was crazy.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I know, I know, but this it's used to illustrate because okay, I would I want I want to play this is the divining rod in this movie kind of represents like things that customs that Koreans have that make no sense to me at first, but I've later adopted like opening the house. Even in the dead of winter, there are times I will open all the windows and doors to clean out the air in the house. I thought this was so illogical when I first came here, and now I do it. Well, one reason is our heating system is different here than it is in different in Korea.
SPEAKER_03Right, back in the States.
SPEAKER_04Uh in the States, it is uh you heat a house by blowing hot air in. In Korea, it is by heating air.
SPEAKER_07And it comes from the ceilings, it comes from the floors.
SPEAKER_04So opening opening up in America, opening up a house in the winter is wasting money. You're you're you're all that wonderful. You're letting your heat go out the door. You're letting your money go out the door. In Korea, it really doesn't make a difference. You know, you're not gonna make a difference.
SPEAKER_07No, actually it doesn't, because it's all water pipes in the floor. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_04You're not gonna make a difference in a heating bill if you open up the house. So it's it's it's it's okay to open up the house at the same time. It it's a practical thing, it reduces chance of disease. It really does clean clean the house out and and it gets rid of a lot of things. And it's practical, but but okay.
SPEAKER_07Well, maybe I will start doing that.
SPEAKER_04My resistance at first, thinking, oh, the locals they're you know, they don't I know better than the locals do. And I would say of course you do. Yeah, um uh my arrogance last year when coronavirus was starting. I was one of the people that was like, Oh, well, masks don't really help. You can't really, you know.
SPEAKER_06And then uh oh, I was like, mask up.
SPEAKER_04Oh, really? Yeah, I was one of the people that didn't. I thought, well, the science does says it's not that effective. And then I changed my mind.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, well, I had a younger sister who works in the medical field in back in the States, yeah. So, like, I mean, Korea was already for like encouraging us to wear masks. So I was like, hey sis, masks, and she was just like, Um, as long as everyone is wearing them, any mask is good.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's where it was. That's where because I was like, I used to say that with uh as far as uh the yellow dust problem that wearing a mask, unless you're wearing like a 3M mask used for for air for painting, uh, it's not that effective. And that's kind of still kind of true. But the purpose of wearing masks, like you just said, if everyone's wearing masks, it reduces the disease. And that I I came around to that. Yeah, I came around to that.
SPEAKER_07But but it again, it's another example of I was immediately like on board masks.
SPEAKER_04Oh, really? No, it's another example of me being arrogant and saying, Oh, well, I know better than my host country does. And then turns out no.
SPEAKER_07No, you were so not yeah, it's okay, you know.
SPEAKER_03We're always learning.
SPEAKER_07We're always learning. We always admit when we're wrong. That's like the big thing, be like, okay, this thing that I did or that I said not right. Wear a mask.
SPEAKER_04Well, remind everyone to watch the show, watch the movie. We're gonna wrap up the show today. This is a good show.
SPEAKER_07Yes, because I feel like I need to go watch Minati. You do, and I feel like I'm probably gonna cry a lot.
SPEAKER_04Uh well, I of course I cried everything.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, yeah. Well, me too, but I'm especially I'm kind of homesick.
SPEAKER_04Oh, it's really gonna make you homesick. It's gonna make you homesick.
SPEAKER_07I'm really homesick for being out in the country, especially well, I mean, especially the countryside of Oklahoma, because that's what I know the most.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I think there's some shots of Oklahoma City in this. Uh yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07And I I mean, I miss like because I'm also from northwest Arkansas, and my mother's family is from the Ozark Mountains in the southern part of Missouri.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_07Do you know how hard it was to say Missouri right then? I always say, I know, I know.
SPEAKER_04You want to say Missouri? Yep.
SPEAKER_07Missouri, oh, yeah. Um, but yeah, so I'm I'm homesick for the Ozark Mountains of Missouri, northwest Arkansas. Oh, and I'm also homesick for Oklahoma, just you know, being out in the middle of nowhere in the countryside, just being surrounded by cows and looking up and seeing all the stars, breathing the fire. I miss it. It's been, it's been like it's been four years since I've been back to Oklahoma. And I had a moment a couple weeks ago, a moment of weakness where I was like chatting with my little sister. I was like, Is it crazy that I'm thinking I want to move back to Oklahoma? And she's like, Yes, even I I'm in the states and I don't even want to go back. Yeah, I'm like, Yeah, it's homesickness. Yeah, yeah. It's homesickness. I'm just homesick.
SPEAKER_04You get back there and it'll cure you after a week.
SPEAKER_07It will go home and visit because usually every time I go home, I'll I give myself a week and a half, and then after like four days, I'm like, I need to get back to Seoul, I need to get back to Seoul. So I just need to go out to the countryside.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, you just need to just need to recharge your batteries. Recharge your batteries.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, yeah. So I am like, anybody who has a car, let's like get a pension out in the country in Korea, just so I can like have like a middle of nowhere.
SPEAKER_04I'm hoping to do because I can't go back to yeah, I want to do that.
SPEAKER_07That's that's just what I need. I yes, I miss Oklahoma, but I can't go there right now. So I'm just like, but I just need countryside, countryside.
SPEAKER_04The Korean countryside is a great substitute, I think. Anyway, it's beautiful. Remind everyone you can catch us at soulpodcast.com on Twitter at Twitter at at King Sejong, uh, Facebook at Facebook.com slash soul podcast, and we're also on YouTube under Zen Kimchi. Uh, we are now experimenting with doing live shows. If you're listening to our podcast, yeah. Uh follow actually, you will find out if you go on Zen Kimchi and subscribe and hit the the bell button, you will be notified when we're going to do a live show. Uh also if you're if you're following us on Facebook, you will know when we're doing a live show. We tend to do this around, we try to do them on Fridays around 7:30 or so. Depends. Yeah. 7 30 or 8.
SPEAKER_07Depends.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Um, but if we get more people uh following us live, and no that way you can participate with us by you know in our chat room. Yes, live.
SPEAKER_07Participate, chat, we'll answer questions, we'll get a debate going.
SPEAKER_04We'll respect that sounds great.
SPEAKER_07I'm down for that. Let's do this.
SPEAKER_04We'll do shout-outs. It'll be fun.
SPEAKER_07Yes, we will do shout-outs, of course. If I if somebody in the chat pops up, then I know I will definitely be like, hey, blah.
SPEAKER_04Oh, we also have a Patreon if anyone wants, but you know. Oh, right, subscribe to us on Patreon.
SPEAKER_05Support us.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, Patreon.com slash patreon.com slash uh uh soul podcast. You get some extra goodies on there. So everyone, thank you so much for listening. Emma, thank you. It's great to hear from you again. Great to see you and Pippin. Until next time. Uh until next time, be safe out there.
SPEAKER_07Be safe. Bye. Love you guys.
SPEAKER_00The solo podcast with the collection of Z International, copyright 2021 under the Creative Commons license. Parts of this podcast may be used for non-commercial purposes if you remember to give us credit. You can contact us at sayomxolpodcast.com. It's S-K-K-O-N-G at soulpodcast. On Twitter at K Sat. Listen to it again. And wait what you hear. See you next week. On Twitter one day TikTok place close down and become a sex store. And then close down and become a kimchi waffle hut. And then close down and become a GS25. And then close down and become a kid's cell phone store. And then close down.
People on this episode
Podcasts we love
Check out these other fine podcasts recommended by us, not an algorithm.
