Kimchi Mamas

Food and Parenthood

There is nothing more satisfying than watching my children eat. At every meal, I encourage my 3 year old, "Eat some more! One more bite! Here is some rice and ghim (seaweed paper), open wide!"

I watch my 5 month old baby at my breast and listen to him swallowing the milk. Gulp gulp gulp... and I smile.

What is it about food that brings people together? Especially in the Korean culture, perhaps due to it's history of war and famine, food is such an important part of life. A very common Korean greeting is, "Did you eat rice?" (literal translation). Parents call their busy children and ask, "Did you eat dinner yet? No? Tsk tsk... you shouldn't skip meals!" The best way to show a guy you love him is to pack him a nice lunch and bring it to his office, according to the Korean dramas! Or maybe buy groceries and cook for him. Better yet, cook him porridge when he is sick. It works the other way around too.

Sign the Petition for Na Young

I was absolutely horrified just now to read this article via a comment by one of our readers. In Seoul, Korea, Na Young (pseudonym), an eight year old girl, was kidnapped, brutally beaten, strangled, raped, and tortured and left to die by a 50 something year old man. AND HE WAS ONLY SENTENCED TO 12 YEARS IN JAIL. He was a repeat offender and had many prior arrests, having served jail time for another rape even. Be warned, some of the articles describe the crime in graphic detail. Apparently, he was drunk when he committed the crime but that is no excuse for the horrendous and truly evil things he did.

Please sign this petition to help bring justice and also to help reform the Korean laws regarding sentencing sex offenders. I am not that familiar with Korean law and the justice system but apparently, it is quite lax. I don't think they have a sex offender registry either. That is what Na Young's mother is asking for. For pictures of sex offenders to be posted at schools and updated every 6 months.

It is SUCH a shame that Korea has such lax laws for sex offenders. In one article, I read that a justice commented that the 12 year term was actually not that lenient, given Korea's laws. WTF? I even read somewhere that the government was taking down posts about this because it didn't want to draw international attention to such a shameful incident.

This is a picture that Na Young drew when asked how she would like the man who raped her to be punished:

Korea, shame on YOU. How can you let this man only serve 12 years in jail? Clearly, with repeat offenses, he is a danger to society and our children. To me, what he did was WORSE than murder. Please Korea, we need to protect our children from such criminals. President Lee and the citizens of Korea, I ask you as a Korean living in America, who still has a lot of pride in her home country, to please prevent this from every happening again. We cannot afford another Na Young.

- Mary

Reunititing Families to Unite A Nation

Whenever North Korea is in the news, and lately that's been pretty frequently, I'm struck by how the media talks about the country as if it were separate - a truly alien and different entity from industrialized, modern, democratic South Korea. And no doubt there is much to separate - over a half century of disparate ideologies, influences and, of course, the DMZ, two and a half miles of the most militarized border in the world.

But if there is any evidence left that Korea is truly one nation waiting for reunification, it is the thousands of Koreans cruelly separated from their family members all these years. Children separated from parents, brothers from sisters. These tragedies are nearly mythic, part of the many narratives of war that our grandparents and parents have carried with them all these years. Over time they become nearly irrelevant, their potency diluted against the mongering of missile testing, sanctions, politics.

But this week, those stories are being told again. 97 families were reunited in the North Korean mountain resort of Keumgang and 99 will be reunited next week. These are families - Korean families - able to embrace each other again after decades of separation. They are the fortunate ones. There are thousands of families who applied who were not picked for this round (and hopefully there will be more) of reunification meetings.

I've read that many people in South Korea are ambivalent - or at least concerned - about reunification, whether it will ever happen and even, whether they want it to, considering the possible economic ramifications. But I know most Koreans still yearn for unification. They still know, despite all their modern differences and latent ideological and political hostilities, that the 38th parallel is truly just an arbitrary line drawn in the sand of one nation. They are not truly North or South, they are simply Korean and one day will be so in name too.

- Nina Moon

Pink parking spots?

No thanks, I'll walk.  Has anyone heard about these new pink parking spots in Seoul?  Apparently, they are part of an effort to make the city more women-friendly.  The pink parking spots are closer, so that women in heels don't have to walk as far.

Somehow, this doesn't quite sit right with me.  I think it's great that some supermarkets here in the U.S. have special parking spots for pregnant women or people with young children.  But for women because of their heels?  Isn't that kind of a different issue than parking for pregnant mothers or people with different abilities?  I only ever wear heels on very special/important occasions, and even then, I change back in to more comfortable shoes as soon as humanly possible. 

I was also surprised to learn that in Seoul, only half of the women have full-time jobs.  According to this Time piece, the pink parking spots are part of a bigger effort that aims to help women find jobs and and also includes things like building more public restrooms, adding lights in public spaces, and more public day-care centers.  I'm in favor of all of these things.  Except the pink parking spots.

~ eliaday, who'd wear flip flops or clogs to work every day if she could.  (h/t Jason for sharing this website with me!)

Kimchi Without the Kimchi

Photo Credit L.A. Times

The L.A. Times reports that Kim Soon-ja of South Korea has invented odorless, freeze-dried kimchi.  I'm no fan of kimchi breath or kimchi-flavored butter, but odorless kimchi sounds like an oxymoron to me. I'll stick to the stinky stuff, thank you.

In other food news, it turns out my daughter's addiction to dried seaweed is actually a good thing. If it were up to her, she would eat nothing but rice and gim at every meal. According to this article from Yahoo Health, seaweed is full of potassium and calcium. Who knew?

--Weigook Saram

Happy Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to all the great Dads out there - we love you and are happy to have you in our lives.  You make our lives beautiful and FULL . . . and the not-so-great Dads - you are a part of the goodness and wonder that made us Moms, Mamas, Mommies and Uhmas. 

As a single mother for a very long time, please take the time to reflect on one of today's Postsecrets:

--Angie in Texas wishes the great dads in her life a great day and the not-so great dad in her life better perspective.

Euna and Laura sentenced to 12 years in labor camps

I'm in shock and I am angry. And worried. Very worried.

Of the conclusions I've seen floated around, this is the worst case scenario come true.

Here are the reports on CNN and the NY Times. Please feel free to add more links in the comments.

My thoughts and prayers are with Euna and Laura and their families right now. Especially Hannah, Euna's four-year-old daughter. God.

- Nina

Laura Ling and Euna Lee's families breaking silence

I know that a lot of us have been watching the news since Euna Lee and Laura Ling were captured, wondering why there haven't been substantial news reports on their plight. Yes, we understood that it's a sensitive situation, that North Korea is unpredictable and that there were surely efforts going on behind the scenes. But as news reports about an American ship captain captured by pirates and then dramatically rescued and then more recently the flurry of news surrounding Roxana Saberi's trial, conviction, appeal and release, the silence around Euna and Laura weighed heavily on my mind.

They are, after all, not so different from us. But more brave. Certainly, I'm sure they knew there was some risk involved in the reporting they were doing, but like so many reporters who report in conflict zones and areas without free press, they did so because they felt compelled to report on the often desperate lives of North Korean defectors in the Chinese border region. They didn't work for big time news organizations and they weren't going to get famous or rich from their reporting, but they were trying to shine a light on stories that would otherwise go untold, unheard, unspoken.

My heart goes out to the Lee and Ling families and I'm sure I cannot imagine how difficult the decision to stay silent - and now to speak out - must be. We must do whatever we can to make sure that Euna and Laura are released! Their June 4 (June 3, in the US) trial is approaching and the Lings and Lees have decided that they can no longer afford to keep silent.

North Korea Uncovered

Interesting article from WSJ on line about uncovering North Korea through Google Earth.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124295017403345489.html#articleTabs%3Darticle

At the event at Stanford that I wrote about, Mr. Shin used Google Earth to show us where Camp No. 14 was... as well as another camp near the northern border where a friend of his was held.  It was eye opening to say the least.  Made his story so much more real.

In the slideshow in the article above, there is one aerial picture of mass graves... of the victims of the "Arduous March."  That's how North Korea refers to the famine that reportedly killed between 1-3 million people.

Laura Ling and Euna Lee to be "tried" in June

I heard an update of their story on NPR yesterday...

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104146763

It's been almost 2 months since they got detained in North Korea.

-Mary