My thing how ever is.. as a South Korean, I HATE how we get grouped in with North Korea sometimes. I also hate when people, in reponse to my being Korean, and when I specify that I’m from the South, the question is: ‘is that the normal one or the crazy one?’, and their faces always change from a cautious, suspicious one to a relaxed one when I (dryly) reply ‘the normal one’. I mean, sure I’m not fan of the North’s actions, policies etc either, but at least get your international knowledge right.

And I guess what prompted me to comment is that even in this entry, Trent had said “…perhaps one of the Asian governments (China, Japan) in the area…” as if South Korea isn’t a separate Asian government on its own from the strict, somewhat unrealistic North Korea. That we just get lumped together. And I’m SURE someone’s bound to jump up here and say ‘wth, you’re just nitpicking!!’ and I’m 99.99999% sure Trent didn’t mean anything by it when he wrote it: but that’s my point. I sometimes feel like SK automatically, unconsciously gets grouped in as a ‘baddy’ just because 1. NK is ‘evil’ and shares the second half of the name, and historically the entire nation, with us, and 2. people’s ignorance. And you may think I’m nitpicking, but hey, Ally’s comment up there is another example – she’s worried about her brother’s well-being because he’s in South Korea. You may say it’s because they’re joined together, but – and It’s only an assumption, but – I bet if he was in China, which is also joined to NK, she probably wouldn’t have said that or been so worried. I just think it’s ignorant of people to make such a big deal out of political situations, happenings about certain situations without having any basic knowledge to start with.

You may think I’m nitpicking, but from my side of things, as a Korean from the SOUTH, I’m just a bit tired of non-Koreans, often Europeans, who crack jokes about how I’m gonna blow them up with my nuclear bombs if people piss me off, just because my ethnicity happens to be Korean. Am I being too sensitive? Maybe. But the first couple of times, I didn’t mind dryly laughing it off. But when people keep bringing that sh.t up just to ‘jokingly’ rile me up? The humour starts to wear thin after a while.

that doesn’t bode well, i suppose.

While I completely disagree with NK’s ruling and think their government is absolutely corrupt and despicable, I think it was also irresponsible for the two journalists to cross the border (or even go near the border without knowing the exact borderlines). Would NK have tested their nuclear weapons if they didn’t capture these two? Maybe. Maybe not. At the end of the day, even if my career is more important than my life, I wouldn’t jeopardize my country’s – and even the world’s – diplomacy and safety by venturing out to the border like that.

@Tracy – Do you mean that the president of North Korea and his army are disgusting? I hope you’re not claiming that every single North Korean is “disgusting”.