Instead of leaving that big steaming pile of unhappy that is "Passion Five Sucks Donkey Dong" on the top of my page, I'm going to put this:
OK, readers. It was a joke. I'm not really the new Korean, and I'm not really quitting Roboseyo. Serious.
But It was one of the better April Fools' pranks I've played, not least because it's more fun to collaborate on a prank than to do it alone: this was all The Korean's idea, though I did the write-up.
So, here are the favorite April Fools' Pranks I've personally done, in approximate order:
1. Coming out and admitting to my family that I've converted to Buddhism. Led to a very serious, very concerned phone call from Poposeyo. Also satisfying because 18 months later, I got another comment from someone ELSE who was also convinced.
2. I'm actually The Korean
3. Coming into my classes on April 1st at the school where I used to work, looking dejected, and telling my students "Sorry, but I took home the tests you wrote for your classes yesterday, and then I lost them... I'm sorry but you have to write them again." (the looks on their faces; the dismay in their voices. So evil! So gratifying!)
4. Writing up D-war as the best Korean movie ever.
And here's the other list I've been thinking about this week. Tell me if you agree or disagree, and tell me what I missed. To avoid wrecking the surprise, I won't name who it is, just in case somebody hasn't seen the movie. It's so much more delightful if it's a surprise.
Greatest Stars Playing Themselves in a Movie Cameo:
1. The Spongebob Squarepants Movie - and before you take issue with this one as number one, go watch the movie. There was no reason to choose THAT star to play this role, but it added a whole other level to the movie, and all the students (and teachers) in my Kindergarten class looked over and went "What's so funny, Rob Teacher?" SO unexpected.
2. Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle
3. Zombieland
4. Annie Hall (the argument in the ticket lineup)
5. Happy Gilmore (the celebrity golf tournament. Howl!)
6. The Hangover
And what am I missing, Readers? I feel like Tom Jones, or William Shatner have done something that deserves to be ranked.
one expat's life in Korea
Friday, April 02, 2010
Passion 5: Nice Design = Crappy Service, and Why Gangnam Restaurants Suck
[Update: I've revisited this topic]
It's ridiculous that it is this way, but what can you do (except complain, warn your friends, and go elsewhere).
OK. Now I'm not that picky, really, about restaurants. Like Zenkimchi Joe, I'm more an enthusiast than a critic, but there are some things I won't abide, and every once in a while - not often - I have an experience that actually upsets me.
Dear readers, I'd like to share a particularly unpleasant experience I had. See, down by Hangangjin Station, between Hangangjin and Itaewon, there's this really, really cool building. It's big and black and beautiful, and in the middle, there's this amazing shining, shimmering, spinning chandelier. I've noticed it and thought about going in there for a long time, readers, out of curiosity at what's going on in such a cool looking building. It's feng shui was fenging me shui down the block!
The Chandelier.
Other bloggers have written about it: the bakery gets good reviews. Even from me. Dan Gray, who likes fusion foods and fancy design with good presentation, has posted on it a number of times.
And famous people like to go there. I saw Jeon Jihyun there once. And a friend spotted a famous politician.
[Update: as of June 9 2010, this post is STILL the top google hit for "Passion 5." Still waiting for the apology. I'm a reasonable man. I'll happily retract this story for a bribe.]
It's ridiculous that it is this way, but what can you do (except complain, warn your friends, and go elsewhere).
OK. Now I'm not that picky, really, about restaurants. Like Zenkimchi Joe, I'm more an enthusiast than a critic, but there are some things I won't abide, and every once in a while - not often - I have an experience that actually upsets me.
Dear readers, I'd like to share a particularly unpleasant experience I had. See, down by Hangangjin Station, between Hangangjin and Itaewon, there's this really, really cool building. It's big and black and beautiful, and in the middle, there's this amazing shining, shimmering, spinning chandelier. I've noticed it and thought about going in there for a long time, readers, out of curiosity at what's going on in such a cool looking building. It's feng shui was fenging me shui down the block!
The Chandelier.
Other bloggers have written about it: the bakery gets good reviews. Even from me. Dan Gray, who likes fusion foods and fancy design with good presentation, has posted on it a number of times.
And famous people like to go there. I saw Jeon Jihyun there once. And a friend spotted a famous politician.
nice looking place.
And that somebody didn't come. And didn't come, and didn't come. I was ready shatter one of the water glasses on the ground just so somebody would come to our table...
Approaching desperation, finally we flagged someone down, possibly with the help of a referee's whistle... and asked them to come and take our orders.
We ordered. I told them, in Korean, that I have a milk allergy, and that I'm allergic to milk, sour cream, cream, and cheese. I pointed at a menu item and asked if it had cheese on it. The guy said it would be OK. I ordered it.
Twenty minutes later, three of our group got their food. The person who brought the food was very well-dressed and groomed, and nice to look at.
And this is what it boils down to: If you're new in Korea, remember this:
The nicer a place looks in Korea, the better the design, the more likely you're going to get shit service, and pay through the nose for it, and end up feeling like you've been mugged. Don't go there until two people whose taste in food you trust ENTHUSIASTICALLY recommend it to you. (This is also my rule for all italian restaurants in Korea: there are so many that it just means there's a lot of mediocre italian out there.)
And if you're a Korean Food Promotion Ministry guy, listen up, because this is for you: THE FANCIEST RESTAURANTS: THE ONES THAT KOREAN TOURISM ALWAYS WANTS TO PROMOTE, ARE ALMOST INVARIABLY MY WORST EATING EXPERIENCES IN KOREA.
But cards on the table: The best Korean food, for one thing, is the cheap, hearty, farmer food. The bibimbaps and the jigaes and the seolongtangs, that are messy, spicy, flavorful, and cheap. The best Korean restaurants are the little ajummah places out in a back alley, where you have to know how to find it, or you never will, and at lunch on a tuesday there's a lineup out the door. I've had slow service, but always a reasonable price and great food, in the dinky hanoks where I've eaten. (The fancy restored ones... jury's out, because I can't afford the 70 000 won per person those kinds of Hanjeongshik places serve... but I bet the jigae jip is better)
For another thing, it seems, again and again and again, that the nicest, fanciest looking restaurants really feel like they can, or ought to be able to, get by on the sheer amazingness of the design of the place, and not have to back it up with a quality menu, or any kind of service at all. I'm convinced that they're not selling themselves as places that serve food, but places to be seen. Try to convince me otherwise. Tell me the waffles at that dumb cafe in Samchungdong really are better than the cheaper ones elsewhere, and that they're worth 15000 won or whatever.
I'm not saying the service at the little mom and pop places is the best all the time... but first of all, they're not charging 20 000 won a plate now, are they? That changes my expectations a bit.
In the fancy places, it sometimes seems like the wait staff was trained to wait for a chogiyo, but everybody feels like they can't shout, because this is a "nice" place, and in the absence of a chogiyo, they think nobody needs any service. People trained in Korean "Chogiyo!" service at a "western" style restaurant where the waiters are (in the western style) supposed to come by and check on you, is about the worst combination I can think of - about as ill-suited as a foot fetishist inviting a leg amputee to salsa lessons on a blind date.
So, to the fancy restaurants in Korea: Listen up and listen good.
I don't give a cracking booger if the owner of your restaurant was on TV.
I don't care if your chef apprenticed at a four-star restaurant in Paris.
I don't care if you spent a bazillion dollars on your layout and design, and if my chair is made of gold leaf, and my plate is a 3000 year old restored artifact from ancient China. YOU'RE A RESTAURANT! Give me good FOOD!
Train your staff in the style of the restaurant you are: if you're western style, train them to come by from time to time and check up on people.
I managed to eat there for a brunch once with my nemesis Dan Gray once, and met a girl named Amy. She was nice, too. Smart. And the food was alright. Portions on the small side. A bit pretentious: you're not allowed to take pictures inside the building. Your food's too good for pictures? Really? Is it vampires?
Look at that: a place that looks that nice MUST have good food and great service, mustn't it?
Well, that's what I'm here to tell you. A couple of weekends ago, it was time to go again, this time for a mini-meeting of some bloggy people, talking about some stuff that might be coming up on the horizon. (oh ain't I such a tease!) I arrived a bit late, joined with the meeting proceedings, and grabbed a menu: I hadn't eaten that morning, in order to especially enjoy my food.
Well, I got the menu, chose what I wanted, and waited.
and waited.
And waited.
We were a table of about 15, and they made us wait. And we were in painfully plain view of the entrance, where the greeter (oh wait: this one had fancy decor, so it must have been a maitre'd) seated people and took your money, and they could see us look around anxiously, and then hungrily, and then angrily, and they made us wait.
and then they came and took orders for drinks... and left.
And we waited more.
Well, I got the menu, chose what I wanted, and waited.
and waited.
And waited.
We were a table of about 15, and they made us wait. And we were in painfully plain view of the entrance, where the greeter (oh wait: this one had fancy decor, so it must have been a maitre'd) seated people and took your money, and they could see us look around anxiously, and then hungrily, and then angrily, and they made us wait.
and then they came and took orders for drinks... and left.
And we waited more.
But the design of our little cubby hole booth was very nice. We had lots of time to admire it.
And then they brought us our drinks, but didn't stick around to take orders; maybe that was somebody else's job.
And that somebody didn't come. And didn't come, and didn't come. I was ready shatter one of the water glasses on the ground just so somebody would come to our table...
Approaching desperation, finally we flagged someone down, possibly with the help of a referee's whistle... and asked them to come and take our orders.
We ordered. I told them, in Korean, that I have a milk allergy, and that I'm allergic to milk, sour cream, cream, and cheese. I pointed at a menu item and asked if it had cheese on it. The guy said it would be OK. I ordered it.
Twenty minutes later, three of our group got their food. The person who brought the food was very well-dressed and groomed, and nice to look at.
The dishes were beautiful. My food didn't come. But the dishes were beautiful.
Twenty more minutes later, we asked them where the rest of our food was.
Ten minutes later, my food came. It was a spaghetti-ish dish. It looked really nice -- attractively presented, as were all the meals. Very attractive. And the staff were well-dressed. And the restaurant's decorations were very nice. Very very nice. And that chandelier... like I said before: wow!
And then I looked a little closer at my food. There were these funny little whitish things on top of it. Maybe shaved ginger - it being a fancy fusion place, you never know what they might put on top of your pasta! Or maybe it was some kind of radishy thing: a taste explosion, perhaps!
It was cheese.
It took about an hour to order, about an hour for my food to arrive (and I was HUNGRY, readers) and the one thing I told them I COULDN'T eat was on the dish they SAID it was OK to order. I didn't send it back, because I didn't want to still be there at freaking closing time. And it wasn't quite enough food to totally satisfy me either. And that and a cup of coffee was 25000 won. It was like being mugged by a guy wearing armani.
The food tasted OK, but I'm never going there again. I don't care who you are.
Oh yeah: I forgot to mention: three THREE people didn't get their food at ALL.
The name of the place is Passion 5. Avoid it.
Twenty more minutes later, we asked them where the rest of our food was.
Ten minutes later, my food came. It was a spaghetti-ish dish. It looked really nice -- attractively presented, as were all the meals. Very attractive. And the staff were well-dressed. And the restaurant's decorations were very nice. Very very nice. And that chandelier... like I said before: wow!
And then I looked a little closer at my food. There were these funny little whitish things on top of it. Maybe shaved ginger - it being a fancy fusion place, you never know what they might put on top of your pasta! Or maybe it was some kind of radishy thing: a taste explosion, perhaps!
It was cheese.
It took about an hour to order, about an hour for my food to arrive (and I was HUNGRY, readers) and the one thing I told them I COULDN'T eat was on the dish they SAID it was OK to order. I didn't send it back, because I didn't want to still be there at freaking closing time. And it wasn't quite enough food to totally satisfy me either. And that and a cup of coffee was 25000 won. It was like being mugged by a guy wearing armani.
The food tasted OK, but I'm never going there again. I don't care who you are.
Oh yeah: I forgot to mention: three THREE people didn't get their food at ALL.
The name of the place is Passion 5. Avoid it.
Somebody tried to excuse them because they appeared understaffed... but how is it MY problem that the restaurant manager didn't bring in enough people to deal with brunch, on a Sunday, in a stylish place... they were surprised people came on Sunday brunch, the best brunch time of the week?
I commented, between the crap service, the nice decor, the outrageous prices, the small portions, and the beautiful presentation of so-so food (it was nicer than the Pomodoro chain, but not ENOUGH nicer to justify double the price), that even though they were Itaewon, they'd managed to succeed in their attempt to convince their diners that they were in Gangnam.
And everybody laughed the knowing laugh that means "Yeah. I've had overpriced mediocre food with beautiful presentation and shit service in a stylish restaurant in Gangnam a BUNCH of times, too."
And this is what it boils down to: If you're new in Korea, remember this:
The nicer a place looks in Korea, the better the design, the more likely you're going to get shit service, and pay through the nose for it, and end up feeling like you've been mugged. Don't go there until two people whose taste in food you trust ENTHUSIASTICALLY recommend it to you. (This is also my rule for all italian restaurants in Korea: there are so many that it just means there's a lot of mediocre italian out there.)
And if you're a Korean Food Promotion Ministry guy, listen up, because this is for you: THE FANCIEST RESTAURANTS: THE ONES THAT KOREAN TOURISM ALWAYS WANTS TO PROMOTE, ARE ALMOST INVARIABLY MY WORST EATING EXPERIENCES IN KOREA.
This is not to say there are no stylish restaurants with good food and good service. Of course not. I've been to a few. Some were amazing, and worth every penny. But every time I HAVE gotten pretentious service and overpriced, mediocre food, it's been in a restaurant just too damn stylish to even look at.
But cards on the table: The best Korean food, for one thing, is the cheap, hearty, farmer food. The bibimbaps and the jigaes and the seolongtangs, that are messy, spicy, flavorful, and cheap. The best Korean restaurants are the little ajummah places out in a back alley, where you have to know how to find it, or you never will, and at lunch on a tuesday there's a lineup out the door. I've had slow service, but always a reasonable price and great food, in the dinky hanoks where I've eaten. (The fancy restored ones... jury's out, because I can't afford the 70 000 won per person those kinds of Hanjeongshik places serve... but I bet the jigae jip is better)
For another thing, it seems, again and again and again, that the nicest, fanciest looking restaurants really feel like they can, or ought to be able to, get by on the sheer amazingness of the design of the place, and not have to back it up with a quality menu, or any kind of service at all. I'm convinced that they're not selling themselves as places that serve food, but places to be seen. Try to convince me otherwise. Tell me the waffles at that dumb cafe in Samchungdong really are better than the cheaper ones elsewhere, and that they're worth 15000 won or whatever.
I'm not saying the service at the little mom and pop places is the best all the time... but first of all, they're not charging 20 000 won a plate now, are they? That changes my expectations a bit.
(my favorite expression of "Expectations are different, stupid" - Jon Stewart, on Crossfire - 7:15 "You're on CNN! The show that leads into me is puppets making crank phone calls!")
Also, at least at the old ajummah place, you're allowed to shout down a waiter and ask for what you want, or just get up and get it yourself. Korean food, Korean service: it works! And it's satisfying; hell, it's even a fun part of the Korea experience, to holla for an extra dish of naengmyeon, or to get up and bring back handfuls of plastic cups of water for everyone at the table! At Passion 5, after the first hour, I'd have been happy to see a 스파게티는 셀프 sign, to step up to a grill and cook the damn spaghetti myself.
In the fancy places, it sometimes seems like the wait staff was trained to wait for a chogiyo, but everybody feels like they can't shout, because this is a "nice" place, and in the absence of a chogiyo, they think nobody needs any service. People trained in Korean "Chogiyo!" service at a "western" style restaurant where the waiters are (in the western style) supposed to come by and check on you, is about the worst combination I can think of - about as ill-suited as a foot fetishist inviting a leg amputee to salsa lessons on a blind date.
So, to the fancy restaurants in Korea: Listen up and listen good.
I don't give a cracking booger if the owner of your restaurant was on TV.
I don't care if your chef apprenticed at a four-star restaurant in Paris.
I don't care if you spent a bazillion dollars on your layout and design, and if my chair is made of gold leaf, and my plate is a 3000 year old restored artifact from ancient China. YOU'RE A RESTAURANT! Give me good FOOD!
Train your staff in the style of the restaurant you are: if you're western style, train them to come by from time to time and check up on people.
Teach your waiters to know what's on the menu, and to check with the chef rather than to freaking lie if they can't answer a question about the menu! I actually appreciate when waiters run to the kitchen to check about dairy, because it shows they actually care that I get food I can eat. Some people have deadly food allergies.
Bring out the food at the same freaking time if you're a restaurant that serves food in individual portions, rather than big pots for everybody to share.
That's the barest, barest of service expectations, and I really don't care if your waitresses are all dressed the same, and are as pretty as those girls in the Korean Air ads, if they can't get my order and my food in a timely fashion, answer questions about the menu, and check in if I need anything.
And Passion 5: you took it pretty hard in this one. But frankly, I'm furious at you! Your service was insulting. If I'd been alone, I would have refused to pay, and made a scene. You just got Google bombed. Choke on it. I choked on my cheesy spaghetti. Twice. Ask the guy next to me, who had to move out of the way twice so I could walk past him and scuttle off to the bathroom to choke in privacy.
And Passion 5: you took it pretty hard in this one. But frankly, I'm furious at you! Your service was insulting. If I'd been alone, I would have refused to pay, and made a scene. You just got Google bombed. Choke on it. I choked on my cheesy spaghetti. Twice. Ask the guy next to me, who had to move out of the way twice so I could walk past him and scuttle off to the bathroom to choke in privacy.
Rant over.
[Update: as of June 9 2010, this post is STILL the top google hit for "Passion 5." Still waiting for the apology. I'm a reasonable man. I'll happily retract this story for a bribe.]
Wanna Chat With Foreign Beauties? Cross-Cultural Friendships: a primer
Read up: Equivocations (or: Yes I know these are sweeping generalizations. I'm not stupid, and neither are you.)
How To Chat With Foreign Beauties: How to Make Friends With a Foreigner: Part 1
How To Chat With Foreign Beauties: How to Make Friends With a Foreigner: Part 2
How To Chat With Foreign Beauties: How to Make Friends With a Foreigner: Part 3
How To Chat With Foreign Beauties: How to Make Friends With a Foreigner: Part 4
Wanna Chat with Korean Buddies? How not to make an Ass of Yourself: Part 1
Wanna Chat with Korean Buddies? How not to make an Ass of Yourself: Part 2
Wanna Chat with Korean Buddies? How not to make an Ass of Yourself: Part 3
Wanna Chat with Korean Buddies? How not to make an Ass of Yourself: Part 4
and bonus material: talking about poop
How To Chat With Foreign Beauties: How to Make Friends With a Foreigner: Part 1
How To Chat With Foreign Beauties: How to Make Friends With a Foreigner: Part 2
How To Chat With Foreign Beauties: How to Make Friends With a Foreigner: Part 3
How To Chat With Foreign Beauties: How to Make Friends With a Foreigner: Part 4
Wanna Chat with Korean Buddies? How not to make an Ass of Yourself: Part 1
Wanna Chat with Korean Buddies? How not to make an Ass of Yourself: Part 2
Wanna Chat with Korean Buddies? How not to make an Ass of Yourself: Part 3
Wanna Chat with Korean Buddies? How not to make an Ass of Yourself: Part 4
and bonus material: talking about poop
Gord Sellar has also just written a great series called "The Five Expat Social Fallacies" which is well worth reading.
The TED Talk that Would Change Korea
I wrote in my "Five things I'd Change" post about something similar to this concept, back when nobody read my blog, but I'd like to share this one with you. Everybody, seriously, everybody should see this one.
Plus, my dear Korean readers: you can ever read it with Korean subtitles on the bottom! I learned a ton in this talk. Watch it. Seriously: watch it. Tell everyone you know!
I believe it was Jason from Kimchi Ice Cream that first put this on his facebook wall. Thanks, man.
Thursday, April 01, 2010
Time to Come Clean About my other Blog
(Video: Jump, by Kriss Kross: the name of the band will make sense soon)
OK, readers. It's time to be a bit more honest over here.
It all started with a bit of an experiment, playing around with anonymity on the Internet... but I really feel like the lie has gotten too big.
See, it started back in 2008, when The Korean from Ask A Korean! (now, with a festive exclamation point!) and I got together to do the "Why Do Expats Complain" series that really put Roboseyo on the map, back when nobody read my blog.
Well, that went so well, that The Korean and I (I even know his real name) have become quite good friends through e-mail correspondence, Skype, and stuff. I even chat online with The Korean Fiance when he's out. (She's really sweet, and hella smart.)
But here's the interesting thing... during the "Expats Complain" thing, one person e-mailed us and said that it seemed like there was an echo going on -- that our writing styles were so similar he suspected we were the same writer. That was amusing to us both, but you know, it's the internet... anything's possible.
So TK and I played around with that idea for a while: it became a running joke between us, and I'd put a phrase into a post that he'd recognize as similar to his style, or he'd do the same to me; nobody else would have noticed if they weren't looking for it, like we were. But then, in December, he asked me if I'd be interested in submitting a post for his site, and seeing if anybody'd spot that it wasn't him writing. So I wrote "Fan Death is Real" in January '09 -- I've always been a fan death believer myself, though deeply closeted, for the sake of the scorn people pour on believers, but I figured everybody's be shaking their heads so much with the "typical of a Korean" prejudice that nobody'd notice it wasn't The Korean's usual writing style.
Well, nobody even noticed a bit -- they just got into the back and forth on the comments, and barely paid attention to the different choice in adjectives.
Emboldened, TK sent me another shocker of a headline: you might not have noticed, but the "I want to Kill the President" post that went up on Roboseyo in March 2009, and discussed free speech in Korea, wasn't written by me at all. Did you notice? I don't know that anybody did.
So it worked... nothing else came of it, and things went on as normal, until a few months ago.
As you know, The Korean got engaged a little while ago, which, along with a promotion at work, left him with no free time to maintain Ask A Korean! at the standard he preferred. So he asked me to step in...
At first I was nervous about taking the extra work on, but honestly, the challenge of writing from a different perspective was so refreshing, I feel like it's been polishing my craft as a writer, so I've been writing both Ask A Korean! and Roboseyo since late January (switching from hotmail to gmail was so that I could manage the mail on an account separate from a few of The Korean's other important, connected online accounts), on the understanding that later, when I'm getting ready for my wedding, he'll take over Roboseyo for a little while.
However, the wheel of fate would turn yet again. Turns out The Korean's promotion led to another, bigger promotion (good for him, I suppose) and this means that, while he has enough time to keep commenting on The Marmot's Hole (that was never me), he's ready to set blogging aside for good.
Given that Ask A Korean! is more popular than Roboseyo ever was by an order of magnitude, and that the question and answer format is so simple the posts practically write themselves, and maintaining two popular, individual blogs is just a little too much, especially now that Hub of Sparkle's back online, I've decided to quit Roboseyo, and devote all my blogging time to Ask A Korean!.
I hope you don't mind, readers: I've really enjoyed doing the Roboseyo blog, and there might still be posts here, more aimed at my close friends and family (more stuff about the rash on my knee than the rash of celebrity suicides: personal, not social commentary), but you'll be happy to know that I'll still be blogging, if you just take the time to switch your bookmarks to Ask A Korean!. To avoid too much confusion, I'll change my own moniker to "The New Korean," to avoid being mistaken with the old Korean. And still feel free to send in translation requests: I have some friends I can farm it out to.
Finally: it's been a great ride. I'm grateful to my readers and especially all the people who left comments and wrote e-mails. I hope for your support at Ask A Korean! as well: Korea remains an inexhaustible topic, and Koreans are an inexhaustibly fascinating people, and i look forward to keeping up the exploration.
All the best, dear readers.
Roboseyo (The New Korean)
It all started with a bit of an experiment, playing around with anonymity on the Internet... but I really feel like the lie has gotten too big.
See, it started back in 2008, when The Korean from Ask A Korean! (now, with a festive exclamation point!) and I got together to do the "Why Do Expats Complain" series that really put Roboseyo on the map, back when nobody read my blog.
Well, that went so well, that The Korean and I (I even know his real name) have become quite good friends through e-mail correspondence, Skype, and stuff. I even chat online with The Korean Fiance when he's out. (She's really sweet, and hella smart.)
But here's the interesting thing... during the "Expats Complain" thing, one person e-mailed us and said that it seemed like there was an echo going on -- that our writing styles were so similar he suspected we were the same writer. That was amusing to us both, but you know, it's the internet... anything's possible.
So TK and I played around with that idea for a while: it became a running joke between us, and I'd put a phrase into a post that he'd recognize as similar to his style, or he'd do the same to me; nobody else would have noticed if they weren't looking for it, like we were. But then, in December, he asked me if I'd be interested in submitting a post for his site, and seeing if anybody'd spot that it wasn't him writing. So I wrote "Fan Death is Real" in January '09 -- I've always been a fan death believer myself, though deeply closeted, for the sake of the scorn people pour on believers, but I figured everybody's be shaking their heads so much with the "typical of a Korean" prejudice that nobody'd notice it wasn't The Korean's usual writing style.
Well, nobody even noticed a bit -- they just got into the back and forth on the comments, and barely paid attention to the different choice in adjectives.
Emboldened, TK sent me another shocker of a headline: you might not have noticed, but the "I want to Kill the President" post that went up on Roboseyo in March 2009, and discussed free speech in Korea, wasn't written by me at all. Did you notice? I don't know that anybody did.
So it worked... nothing else came of it, and things went on as normal, until a few months ago.
As you know, The Korean got engaged a little while ago, which, along with a promotion at work, left him with no free time to maintain Ask A Korean! at the standard he preferred. So he asked me to step in...
At first I was nervous about taking the extra work on, but honestly, the challenge of writing from a different perspective was so refreshing, I feel like it's been polishing my craft as a writer, so I've been writing both Ask A Korean! and Roboseyo since late January (switching from hotmail to gmail was so that I could manage the mail on an account separate from a few of The Korean's other important, connected online accounts), on the understanding that later, when I'm getting ready for my wedding, he'll take over Roboseyo for a little while.
However, the wheel of fate would turn yet again. Turns out The Korean's promotion led to another, bigger promotion (good for him, I suppose) and this means that, while he has enough time to keep commenting on The Marmot's Hole (that was never me), he's ready to set blogging aside for good.
Given that Ask A Korean! is more popular than Roboseyo ever was by an order of magnitude, and that the question and answer format is so simple the posts practically write themselves, and maintaining two popular, individual blogs is just a little too much, especially now that Hub of Sparkle's back online, I've decided to quit Roboseyo, and devote all my blogging time to Ask A Korean!.
I hope you don't mind, readers: I've really enjoyed doing the Roboseyo blog, and there might still be posts here, more aimed at my close friends and family (more stuff about the rash on my knee than the rash of celebrity suicides: personal, not social commentary), but you'll be happy to know that I'll still be blogging, if you just take the time to switch your bookmarks to Ask A Korean!. To avoid too much confusion, I'll change my own moniker to "The New Korean," to avoid being mistaken with the old Korean. And still feel free to send in translation requests: I have some friends I can farm it out to.
Finally: it's been a great ride. I'm grateful to my readers and especially all the people who left comments and wrote e-mails. I hope for your support at Ask A Korean! as well: Korea remains an inexhaustible topic, and Koreans are an inexhaustibly fascinating people, and i look forward to keeping up the exploration.
All the best, dear readers.
Roboseyo (The New Korean)
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