Korea – Page 20

Seoul’s New City Hall

I drove by the Seoul City Hall this morning and found a large section of the city hall missing. Gone in an instant, just like the temporary ice rink that was dismantled a couple weeks ago. A section of the city hall, the northeast portion of the building, was completely gone, torn down virtually overnight. I was surprised by the speed and stealth at which the city moved to dismantle it.

Mayor Lee Myung-bak strikes again, I thought to myself. Mayor Lee of Seoul is the one who spearheaded the greenification of the area in front of City Hall before the 2002 World Cup, a greenspace perhaps best known as the epicenter of a sea of "Red Devil" Korean soccer fans. As mayor, Lee also spearheaded the effort to create a park at Namdaemun, or South Gate. He led the effort to turn the elevated freeway above Cheongye Stream into an eco-park, a wildly successful project (now if he could just do something about the traffic…). Mayor Lee has done a good job beautifying Seoul by supplanting concrete jungle with greenspace at key locations. Although the projects have negatively affected some Seoul businesses and residents, most Koreans strongly support Lee’s efforts to improve the city’s image through beautification projects. In fact, Mayor Lee’s efforts are so popular that he is now the favorite to be Korea’s next president (elections are in late 2007).

I wondered why the city had decided to dismantle a big section of the city hall, so I did some research and discovered that the City of Seoul is planning to build a new city hall tower next to its current city hall. The current building, a C-shaped building built in 1926 and designated a historical landmark, is a rough granite remnant of the Japanese colonial occupation. The new city hall will be a 22-story tower standing next to the remaining portion of the old city hall. That explains the demolition of the northeast section of the building, I thought. When the Bank of Korea built a new location across the street from its former home, it left the original Japanese colonial building intact as a historic landmark. According to Korea University’s web site, the new city hall tower will be reminiscent of Bukhan-san, the mountain just north of downtown, and it will aestetically meld new and traditional architectural designs. The firm charged with designing the new city hall building also designed other stylish buildings in Seoul, including Tower Palace and the Sang-am Landmark Building.

Dongnimmun (Independence Gate)

On Saturday, my wife and I visited Dongnimmunin in Seodaemun, an area in western Seoul. Dongnimmun, or Independence Gate, was constructed in 1898 by Dr. So Jae-Pil, a leading Korean reformer, and his supporters. The gate sits on the site of Yôngûnmun, the former western gate of Seoul dedicated to receiving Chinese envoys who arrived in Korea annually to collect tribute on behalf of the Chinese Emperor. Yôngûnmun, a symbol of Korea’s status as a Chinese vassal state, was demolished in 1895 amidst fervent pro-independence sentiment. The 1890’s were a turbulent time in Korean history, when Korea sought to exert its independence from a weakening Chinese Qing Dynasty and fought to hold off an expansionist Japanese Empire that annexed Korea as a colony in 1910. In 1897, Korean King Gojong proclaimed that Korea would be known as the Korean Empire in a vain attempt to insulate itself from Japanese influence. However, the "Korean Empire" lasted just 12 years, when the Japanese dissolved Korea’s monarchy and annexed it as a colony.

Today, Dongnimmun stands in Yôngûnmun’s stead as a symbol of Korea’s political and cultural independence. Despite its symbolic and rhetorical value, Dongnimmun is perhaps the least known of Seoul’s four city gates. The other three gates are Namdaemun (South Gate), Dongdaemun (East Gate), and Gwanghwamun, the main gate guarding Gyeongbok Palace, Korea’s former royal palace. Namdaemun and Dongdaemun are especially well known because of their large, neighboring street markets. All three are traditional, Chosun Dynasty-era city gates (Yôngûnmun was also a Chosun-era gate). In contrast, Dongnimmun is a newer, western-style structure reminiscent of the Arc du Triomphe in Paris and numerous other copycat structures built worldwide. Although the site where Dongnimmun is located is called Seodaemun, or "West Gate," no gate exists by that name.

Dongnimmun is a bit nondescript, standing in the shadow of an elevated highway. It is weathered with age, made of drab stone blocks, and a bit smallish in comparison to the other gates of Seoul. Two pillars from Yôngûnmun remain and stand sentry on either side of Dongnimmun. If one is unaware of Korea’s recent history, one might miss the significance of this place. However, a fuller understanding of the Independence Club, The Independent newspaper, and Korea’s move towards self-reliance in the face of Japanese aggression and Chinese disengagement bring a powerful sense of historical weight to bear on the site. The National Assembly web site has an article on the Independence Club, an influential group in the early years of the 20th century that, among other things, popularized the use of hanguel, Korea’s unique writing system. Dongnimmun is a visible manifestation of this period. Once you learn about the years 1895 and 1910 and Korea’s fledgling independence movement, the site really comes to life.

Still fighting a cold–and Spanish

Dear Reader, I haven’t been feeling well lately and haven’t had much energy to write. I will write about last weekend’s escapades tomorrow. I feel a little better tonight, so I think the worst has passed (I hope). When I get sick, I usually recover in about four to five days. I spent some time at my desk today finishing some lingering projects, including the course I’ve been teaching, performance metrics, and an economic assignment. I also saw some photos of our housing in Asuncion, Paraguay, our next destination. The housing in Asuncion–at least the exterior–is absolutely amazing. Seeing where we will be living really helped lift my spirits today. People say that once you know your next assignment, you start mentally disengaging from your current one. In a sense, that’s very true. I’m already planning in my mind some of the steps we need to take to leave Korea and head to our next destination. In just 11 months, I am scheduled to depart from Seoul, and the time will pass very, very quickly.

I signed up for a self-study Spanish course, the same one I signed up for in mid-2005 and then canceled because I had already qualified for a short Spanish language course. I dropped the course because I did not want to study Spanish, take the Spanish language exam, then score worse than my previous score, thereby disqualifying myself from Spanish-language assignments, including the job in Paraguay. Now that I know I am headed to a Spanish-speaking country and need to become fluent in Spanish by June 2007, I need to get serious about improving my Spanish speaking and reading skills. I will only be in the U.S. for about four months (from February until June). We will be on home leave for 40 days, and then I receive one month of specialized training starting in April 2007. That leaves just two months, or less than eight weeks, to acquire fluency in Spanish. While English speakers can quickly learn Spanish, it would be foolhardly to assume that eight weeks is enough to achieve fluency. Hence, I seriously need to study Spanish from now until I leave Korea. I started studying it again last week and discovered a renewed interest in language learning. I had forgotten how much fun it can be to learn a foreign language! Having progressed from Spanish and French to German, and then on to Chinese and Korean (learning none of them well), I lost my desire to learn languages as they became increasingly complicated. Learning Korean was brutal. Learning a relatively easy foreign language such as Spanish is reinvigorating. In fact, I think I’ll say goodnight and crack open my Spanish book for a few minutes before I fall asleep. Every little bit helps.