MORE SENSELESS ACTS OF BLOGGERY

Here in Hong Kong, Sam Hui is generally recognized as one of the founders of what’s known as Cantopop, as he was one of the first and most successful singer-songwriters of the early 70s to sing pop/rock songs in the local Cantonese dialect instead of Mandarin, as was the tradition beforehand.

One of my favorite songs of his is “Students”. I don’t understand much of the lyrics, but I love the chord progression and key changes.



Turns out it’s actually a cover version of this song, which was a big hit in South Korea in the mid-60s and still gets a lot of tribute/karaoke action to this very day.



And it turns out that that song – the title of which translates to “Washington Square” – is actually an adaptation of this instrumental recorded a year earlier by "folk-Dixie" outfit The Village Stompers.



It’s an interesting evolution. Someone in Korea basically took an American instrumental and wrote some original Korean lyrics for it, then ten years later Sam Hui took that version and wrote some original Cantonese lyrics for it.

(I’m assuming he swiped the music from the Korean version rather than the US version. My conclusion is based on the fact that the Korean version contains one minor chord change from the original, and the Sam Hui version uses the Korean chord changes.)

Isn't this interesting?

All around the world,

This is dF

Remember when I told you about the official chocolate of the Korean DMZ?

I finally got around to scanning the boxes.





The difference is that the chocolate in the top box has a candy shell and looks like bird's eggs.

DISCLAIMER: Of course this is not the only chocolate to be found in the DMZ. I got a Crunky bar and a Ghana bar as well while I was there. But as far as I know, to get this specific chocolate, you gotta go to the DMZ. Or at least if you want it in the DMZ packaging.

Postcard inside,

This is dF

No package tour is complete without yr entire group being set loose in trendy shopping areas, and this was no different. Of course, since I’m only interested in books and CDs, for me it’s more of an excuse to take photos of street scenes.

Like this.



These were taken mostly around Myongdong, Sinchon Station and Gunpo, and give you a fairly good idea of what Seoul is like at street-level: busy and full of shops, snack stalls and cute signs.

FUN FACT: Back when I was going to Seoul more regularly – which is to say around ten years ago – I went to Myongdong quite often because that’s where Tower Records was. It’s not there anymore, of course. But I’ll always remember it because it’s where I bought a replacement copy of Bad Religion’s Recipe For Hate – which is significant because it has a note on it saying it was cleared by the Korea Censorship Board.

Which I find amusing in a grim way.

PRODUCTION NOTE: Korea’s govt-run censorship board has since been replaced by the Korea Media Ratings Board, which is less stringent unless yr talking about songs by Rain, who is too sexy for the govt.

Respect.

Next: the thrilling conclusion!

Street legal,

This is dF

Here’s something you may not know about me: the first ever “Asian” food I ever tried was Korean food. I tried it in Clarksville, TN at a Korean restaurant near Fort Campbell, and became a regular for the 4.5 years I lived there – which is also how I learned to use chopsticks long before I ever moved to Hong Kong.

So of course, when I go to Korea, food is a highlight. And as you can see, it’s not all kimchi.



Which isn’t to say we didn’t have much kimchi. Quite the opposite. We even made our own (the woman at center row, right? That’s our kimchi instructor).

But that mosaic is a bit misleading in that 80% of our meals (included in our tour package) looked a lot like the 8th photo (bottom row, center). They were good, but hot pots get tedious after a few days – especially when yr looking forward to Korean BBQ where you cook yr own meat.

So we took advantage of street snack stalls when we could – such as that corn dog coated with french fries (top row, right), or the BBQ chicken/kidney kebabs (top row, center). The chicken kebab was the one that almost killed both me and the bridal unit from Spice OD. The french-fried corn dog was okay but messy and something I should probably never eat again.

The best snack food: the pancake on a stick with a fried egg in the middle (center row, left).

Not pictured: the donuts we had at a Mister Donut in Myongdong, and the banana crepe handrolls in the Doota food court.

A word about the moose head:

That’s the Beer Liquor Cabin, a place near our hotel in the suburb of Gunpo. We went kicking around after dinner, saw the moose head and instantly needed to walk in and drink something. As you do. The whiskey was pricey, so I stuck with Cass beer. We also had clams. In a hot pot, of course.

Final note: one thing I noticed in Seoul was that cafes and bars aren’t always separate businesses. I lost count of how many signs I saw saying: “Coffee, Beer, Whiskey”.

Also: the last time I was in Seoul was something like 2002. One obvious difference: there are a lot more Starbucks now.

Next: the police!

Are you going to eat that,

This is dF

I’m back from my tour of Seoul and the DMZ. I have pictures. You will see them one day.

In the meantime, I should state that Team Def categorically denies any involvement, participation or undisclosed knowledge of the following:



Obviously this was all over the local news in SK. Our tour bus driver was following it on his dashboard digital TV and giving updates to our tour guide to relate back to us – and at least one person in that info chain seemed convinced North Korea did it because it would be just like them, the bastards, wouldn’t it?

But then South Korea is understandably nervous about this kind of thing, what with North Korea being the crazy unpredictable neighbor with a score to settle and all. And of course it wouldn’t be the first time the NK and SK navies mixed it up a little, though actually torpedoing a ship and sinking it – or supposedly putting a sea mine in its path on purpose – raises the stakes considerably.

Assuming that’s what happened. We’ll find out soon, I suppose, one way or the other – although the usual suspects have unsurprisingly drawn their own conclusions.

And of course it’s all Obama’s fault, because Kim Jong-Il would NEVER have tried a stunt like this when Bush was in office (except for, you know, that one time – otherwise, sure, he stuck to minor-league stuff like missile launches and nuclear bomb tests).

Anyway, not to sound blase about it, but even though the news broke the day we were visiting the DMZ – which provided detailed historical context of the North/South dilemma – we didn’t feel as though we were in any imminent danger of being caught up in an impending war, if only because we were getting our info via second-hand translation or via the local Korean TV channels which we couldn’t understand, not speaking Korean (plus CNN was broken in the hotel).

But even then, as I said, NK and SK have had scraps before, and the truth is neither SK nor any of its allies (or even China) really wants to restart the Korean Police Action if they can avoid it, so I figured the chances of a full-scale attack during our vacation were pretty slim.

So stand by for the usual photos of food, landmarks, amusing storefronts and M*A*S*H references, is what I’m saying.

Don’t rock the boat,

This is dF