Tag: motherland

O PILSUNG KOREAAAAAAAA

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

South Korea mops floor with Japan, 2-0; wins Olympic Bronze medal in men’s soccer

Third place has never felt so awesome.  Seriously, sometimes fighting for the bronze medal seems more prestigious than getting a silver, because in most versus Olympic events, silver is the consolation prize for being the guy who lost to the gold medalist.  Bronze medal events are the ultimate tests for redemption; the losers get no medals, and only in the act of winning can you earn your spot on the Olympic podium and walk away with a medal at all.

The fact that the Koreans beat Japan for the bronze medal is just icing on the cake.  The cherry on top.  Gravy.

Continue reading “O PILSUNG KOREAAAAAAAA” →

It’s funny how things turn out in time

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Last weekend, I was up in NOVA during the trip I couldn’t get back from, and I went to a baseball game with my dad.  During the drive up to Frederick, Maryland, we got stuck in the typical I-270 traffic, due to the fairly abrupt ending of the third lane.  It’s not like my dad and I have a ton of things to talk about in the first place, especially with the language difficulties between us in the first place.

For whatever reason, my dad decided to start a topic which was akin to my mom and aunts always badgering me about how I need to get married and start popping out grandkids.  The fact that it was coming from my dad was a little strange, but I guess deep down, he too wants to have some mighty grandchildren to carry on the Hong family name and bloodline, but truthfully my dad is fantastic with babies really.

It started with him bringing up a girl I went to elementary and high school with and even the same church, who is the same age as I am, and her dad is friends with my dad.  And how about she’s now engaged, and that he was invited to the wedding as guests of the parents I guess.  But then he said that she’s marrying a Vietnamese guy, and I just kind of snort-laugh, you know the sound I’m talking about.  A Korean girl marrying a Vietnamese guy, it’s laughable to me, kinda.

Continue reading “It’s funny how things turn out in time” →

What does this Korean kid have in common with Brian Urlacher?

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

They’re both professionals.

Obviously, I can’t use the term “athlete” for the professional gamer, because there’s absolutely nothing athletic about PC gaming.  No matter how much professional gaming tries to imbue physical statistics into gaming, like how fast a guy can click on a mouse.

I came across this Kotaku article, and going through it it set off a wide range of emotions and thoughts, and here I sit, brogging away about it.  It’s no secret to me these days that gaming is taken pretty seriously back in the Motherland, and even my parents have made the backhand remark that perhaps I should have gone somewhere with my own adolescent gaming habits, regardless of how hard they disapproved it back then.  But it’s gotten to the point in Korea, where I kind of look at how seriously it’s taken, and feel nothing but a wide range of negatively-connotative emotions.

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A relic of ancient times

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I’m currently at my parents’ house in Virginia, and I was rooting through some old things in the basement.  I stumbled upon this magnificent jewel of the past.  My mom got this for me back in like 1989 on a cold Saturday morning after Korean school.  It was purchased from a Kiddie City Toys.  The original set of four AA batteries lasted all of three days as I, my sister and one of my cousins sought 100 lines in Tetris.

I can’t believe I remember all these little details.  It’s also hard to believe that the handheld division of Nintendo started with this brick, which actually doesn’t feel so much like a brick any more.  Granted, compared to an SP, it’s monstrous, but in my hands again, it didn’t feel like I was holding a hoagie or anything.  What an amazing journey it’s been for Nintendo in this regard; what started out as the puke green brick, ended up being the only thing keeping the entire company afloat when Pokemon games continued to sell in the midst of the CD-based console wars, and now Nintendo is among the triple crown of game companies all over again.  And now it’s called The 3DS.

But there would be no 3DS if not for this Game Boy.  Funny how things work out.

Walking Dead’s Glenn episode ftw

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Episode six of Walking Dead season 2 was probably the best episode evar.  Dating back to episode four, I’m ecstatic to see that my Atlanta-based, Korean-American boy, Glenn, is getting some significant character development and face time this season.  Furthermore, my heart and my fandom rejoices for the character, when he gets to have some post-zombie apocalyptic spontaneous sex action with the hot farmer’s daughter, Maggie.

This makes me happy in a myriad of ways:

  • Stephen Yeun playing Glenn is fantastically awesome.  Lauren Cohan playing Maggie is ridiculously hot.
  • It’s always been perceived as kind of taboo to have Asian people actually getting any makeout scenes with non-Asian people.  More so for Asian guys than Asian women.  And even more so for television than in movies.  It took forever for physical affection between interracial pairings to be portrayed in movies, and even longer for it to make it to television.  What I’m trying to say is that this kind of pairing, on cable television, feels like somewhat of an evolution of tolerance and acceptance of this kind of occurrence actually getting to happen.
  • Subsequently, mentally I’m thinking “fuck yeah Glenn, way to score with the hot farmer’s daughter!” which is kind of like living vicariously through a potential fantasy.
  • The Glenn character is getting some much deserved spotlight, and is a refreshing reprieve from ambiguous pregnancy, eventual heel turn and angsty gun-hungry cunt.  He wasn’t just the greaseman for once and was actually getting some lines, action, and a chance to portray a hero and a friend.

But mostly, I’m really just crushing hard on the Maggie character.  I will not look forward to the “mid-season break” that the show will embark on after Sunday, although I understand why it’s being done.  At least the wait won’t be that long, and that they’re not pulling the Sopranos bullshit, of not really letting anyone know when any new episodes would air at all.

I blame the weeaboos

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Passing through downtown, I saw a restaurant that’s going to be opening soon.  The name of the restaurant literally means “mom” in Korean (not pictured above).  So obviously, this is going to be a Korean restaurant.

“Korean / Japanese Restaurant”

Okay, this shit pisses me off.  Everyone knows that this restaurant is going to be 95% (probably poorly made) Korean food, but have a guy on site to cut raw fish and pass it off as sushi.  Why pretty much every Korean restaurant in the United States needs to add the slash-Japanese to their description is purely beyond me, and it agitates the fuck out of me.

Korean food is fucking awesome.  Korean barbecue is better than Japanese hibachi any day of the week and fifty times on Sunday.  Korean soups and stews are hearty and satisfying, while the Japanese renditions of such are watery and minimalist.  Japanese food is hipster feed.  Korean food is soul food.  Good food.

Fuck Japanese food.  Why Korean restaurants denigrate themselves by feeling the necessity to add Japanese to their description is completely beyond me, but if I can help it, I won’t ever eat at any Korean / Japanese restaurants.  I’m proud of my Korean heritage, and I wish the people that ran these fucking restaurants would be proud of theirs too, to where they’d be proud to serve Korean food to people of other races with confidence and pride, and without the veiled deception that adding loosely Japanese items would draw them in instead.

I blame weeaboos, and anyone who watched Lost in Translation and thinks everything is better if it’s Japanese for creating this stigma that Japanese shit is so great.  It pains me to see Korean restaurateurs feel the need to add / Japanese to their names thinking it would enhance their business.  If I ever opened a Korean restaurant, I would proudly declare it as such.  I would give it a Romanized name based off of an appropriate Korean word, but underneath it would say “FUCKING KOREAN FOOD RESTAURANT.”  And if any weeaboos or any similar noobs enter my establishment and try to order a fucking bento box or yakisoba, I’ll kick them the fuck out, and dispute the shit out of their one-star Yelps.

Korean food is the best food in all of Asia.  The sooner people realize this, the better off the world will be.

A day in the life of 99.9999% of Korean men*

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment
  • 0730 – Wake up
  • 0731 – Smoke
  • 0800 – Leave for work
  • 0801 – Smoke in car
  • 0820 – Get stuck in Atlanta traffic
  • 0821 – Smoke in frustration
  • 0855 – Arrive at work
  • 0900 – Smoke break
  • 0910 – Run into Korean co-worker on the way back in
  • 0911 – Don’t want buddy to smoke alone
  • 1000 – Starbucks walk
  • 1010 – Smoke on the way back
  • 1020 – Brush teeth in men’s room rid smoke breath
  • 1030 – Actual work
  • 1200 – Smoke break
  • 1230 – Lunch
  • 1230 – Smoking also
  • 1330 – Brush teeth again
  • 1335 – Work
  • 1500 – Smoke break
  • 1515 – Work
  • 1600 – Smoke break
  • 1615 – Realize it’s past 4pm, phone in day, go smoke
  • 1700 – Leave
  • 1700 – Smoke on the way to the car
  • 1710 – Get stuck in Atlanta traffic
  • 1711 – Smoke in frustration
  • 1735 – Victory smoke in getting out of traffic
  • 1800 – Arrive home
  • 1805-2200 – Eat dinner, polish off pack of smokes, etc

*does not include dannyhong