A cute chicken says "Happy New Year 2005"

If anybody asked me, "How's your day going?"
I would say, "I'm too busy for now."

Since 3 weeks ago, I've felt I should replicate me due to a bunch of work to do by myself. I couldn't recognize when 2004 Christmas left from my town. How sad it was!

A few people like Rbaht suspect what the hell bugged me. OK! I'm gonna tell you what I've done by now. Firstly, I signed up a contract with a new client regarding implementing a marketing project. As soon as I did, I posted a "Help Wanted" notice on the Internet to find great, smart employees for the marketing project and interviewed some candidates for research associates. In the meantime, I several times met the client to have a grasp of his problems and compelling needs. Of course, after every meeting, I drew up terribly thick proposals.

Take 5!! Secondly, I designed a simple system for managing research materials and outsourced the development of the system. You know it's a big deal so I had to work even on Sundays.

Lastly, I discussed and studied with newly employees regarding what to research, how to manage data they'll find and what to extract from the data in order to analyze.

Hey Rbaht! How is my Brazilian coffee? Don't worry. I'll get it soon.

Everybody, "Happy New Year!"



thanks beastgood

Golden Thursday!

Golden Thursday!

I make a rule to get up late and go to bed late! I know It's one of my bad habits, though. That's not the point of what I want to say by the way.

In the morning of the day, I've got a call from KTF, a Korean mobile communication service provider, to let me know about the fact that I've had a good opportunity to experience its service for free and it will pay me a reward-250,000 Won (around 240 US$).

In the afternoon of the day, I've got a call from LGT, another Korean mobile communication service provider, to let me know about the fact that my simple marketing proposal could be accepted so I will have to visit its office with my full proposal the following day.

What a wonderful Thursday it was!

In addition, there have arrived 5 bottles of expensive "brand new yogurt" in my workplace. They all were freebies. I played a game on the Internet to get the freebies a few weeks ago. Eventually I've got the 5 bottles as a prize.

Rbaht!

A close ex-coworker of mine flew to Sao Paulo in Brazil a few days ago without notice. You know he is the very man that went to a Turkish restaurant in Itaewon with me almost 2 weeks ago. We celebrated the event that he just got out of his unemployed life. And finally he advanced into the new world Brazil, the opposite side of Korea.

Of course I have no idea of what exactly he's gonna do there and how long he plans to stay there for. Because, as mentioned above, he's never told me about his business trip to Sao Paulo. And I got to know of his trip thru an entry of his blog.

He added in his blog that he will give a presentation regarding KMS(Knowledge Management System) and, afterwards, stop by HOOTERS I'm interested in around there.

"Hey, Rbaht! Do you hear me?
Anyhow, in the depression of Korean economy, I hope that you earn lots of US$ there, post funny and weird stories about Sao Paulo in your blog, and buy me a good souvenir."

Animation Magazine

I met with Jean, president of Animation Magazine last week when she participated in BCWW. One of my friends, Amber referred her to me so that she may meet a proper person who can help her to publish the Korean edition of Animation Magazine. Anyhow, thanks a million, Amber!

Actually I don't like animation stuff too much except in my childhood. Why? Well, since almost 30 years ago, I've seen a lot of animation movies produced by Hollywood like "The Lion King", "The Little Mermaid" and the like. I know the animation movies are almost perfect and fantastic in terms of their storylines and cutting edge techniques. However, I doubt whether there would be intentionally hidden messages like pro-Capitalism, pro-Americanism and pro-Neo Conservatism in their movies. Plus, I easily feel bored as soon as I start to watch one. I suppose I already got adapted to Hollywood styles and I ended up failing to find out anything intriguing from it.

Back to my work!

Then We talked a lot about how to publish the Korean edition of it. Yet we couldn't find any good solution to do that. In the depression of Korean economy, nobody wants to invest into any risky projects. I emphasized that we would have to find a proper publishing house at first. Alas, it seemed to me that she didn't completely agree with me and she got an interest in how to translate, audit and distribute her future Korean magazines. Okay, I already realized how much different two cultures are. Accordingly one of my work is to be a bridge between two.

A tip:
You should know that, if you want to penetrate your product or service into a Korean market, don't regard it an easy job.

Korean star creates Tokyo frenzy

Korean star creates Tokyo frenzy



Korean actor Bae Yong-joon has been greeted by 7,000 screaming fans on a visit to the Japanese capital Toyko.

The 32-year-actor, who has starred in hit television dramas shown in Japan, is known as Yong Sama - a name which means "royalty" in Japanese.

The star has become one of the most popular actors in Japan due to a fashion for all things Korean.

Bae has become a household name for his role in Winter Sonata, a soap opera which scored huge ratings.

The actor said he was worried before making the trip to Tokyo.

Love affair

"I could hardly sleep last night. I was worried there would be so many fans that they might hurt themselves," he said.

The thousands of mainly middle-aged female fans who turned out to see Bae either cried or grabbed pictures of him on their mobile phones.

Japan's love affair with Korea follows a tense history between the two nations, after the Japanese occupation of the Korean peninsula from 1910-45.

But the popularity of recent Korean soap operas has strengthened the sense of cultural affinity between the two countries.

Around 100,000 Japanese women are expected to go on tours of South Korea which feature locations from Winter Sonata.

The dramas usually feature traditional Asian values like repsect for parents, plus romance and nostalgia.

Critics have called the soap operas "soppy", and said that Japanese people should concentrate on changing their attitudes to ethnic Koreans who live in Japan.

link: BBC

# # # # #

I watched Winter Sonata (겨울연가 in Korean) 3 years ago. I liked it much. Also my homestay mother who is from Italy watched it in 2002 when I was in Vancouver. She told me that it was a very sad story but she liked this kind of thing too much.

I've thought about the reasons that many Korea dramas are based on sadness.

One of them could be that Korean people have been suffering from hidden sorrowful memories from the eras of the Japanese occupation of the Korean peninsular, Korean War and the ruling of militarists. Thus, perhaps sad stories can touch a string in their heart.

I like Jazz and Blues too. It seems to me that Korean grief would be the same spirit as Blues and negro spirituals.