Tag: motherland

Man, the League scene has certainly changed

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

It might sound like something that might’ve never happened, but I haven’t played League of Legends in nearly a month.  While mythical gf was out of the country, I spent most of that time doing little projects around the house to try and surprise her with some cosmetic changes here and there, and because I was on permanent dog duty that whole time, I didn’t feel good about hiding out in my office playing League for hours for the sake of the dogs.

I don’t really miss it, or have any anxiety at not having earned any IP blue essence in that time; considering that among my friends I’m the only one who’s been the closest to having been the most regular player, it’s easier to have walked away, considering I haven’t been leaving anyone behind in the process.

But I don’t intend on staying away, since ultimately I still did enjoy the game, it’s just that I found other things to do with my spare time than play League, but until that time comes, it’s almost been a full month since the last time I queued up on the Abyss, and there are sure to have been a hundred little tweaks and changes that will blindside me the next time I log in.

However, as long as it’s been since I last played, it’s been nearly triple that, that I’ve paid any attention to the League esports scene.  It’s funny to think that like 2-3 years ago, I was really into the weekly standings and looking up videos and recaps afterwards, to get the condensed action minus all the mundane boring farming and laning phases of the games, and I’d care about who was on top in NA, all the way to trying to figure out what darkhorse secondary region was doing what.

Continue reading “Man, the League scene has certainly changed” →

Back in my day

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

I read this article about parents who not only encourage their children to get good at Fortnite, but they’re actually paying “tutors” to “coach” them to become better at it, and I’m not entirely quite sure how I feel about it.  In one hand, we have a microcosm of how much the world has changed in which video games aren’t just more accepted than they used to be, gaming itself has become a viable occupation for people to strive for and a platform in which real, legitimate earnings can be made through.  But in the other hand, we have the basically the direct antithesis of the ideals and mentalities that people in my generation and older grew up through, where gaming was a waste of time, source of rotting for brains, and a definitive negative influence on our lives.

After reading this article, the question that popped into my head that I’ll probably query people on theFacebook about is whether they’d wish if they were a kid today, where video games are accepted and viable career options, but the world around them is psychotic, we live in a borderline police state, and school shootings are almost a reoccurring lottery in which one unlucky school seems to get chosen every few months for a tragedy.  Or, if they were content with the lives past lived, where video games were frowned upon by our parents, but we still played them anyways, and the world was slightly less psychotic and was for lack of a better term, safer.

All I can think of is that if I were a kid in today’s world, my parents would probably very much encourage my gaming habits, especially since it’s already been demonstrated, primarily in Korea, just how lucrative video gaming careers could possibly get.  Instead, I grew up in the 80s when Atari and Nintendo invented basically cancer machines that distracted, deviated and held back appropriate childhood upbringing, and was blamed for just about every negative behavior that children could possibly exhibit.

I remember reading in like GamePro or EGM, an interview by a Street Fighter II pro, that may or may not have been Justin Wong.  They talked about how they had a manager, and how they practiced SF2 for 3-4 hours a day, and all I could think about was if my mom found out I played video games for 3-4 straight, she would yell at me and tell me to go read a book.  No, this is precisely what occurred when I first got my Super Nintendo and was playing Super Mario World non-stop from when she went to work and came home, and I was in exactly the same place, still playing.

Continue reading “Back in my day” →

O PILSUNG COREA MOTHERFUCKERS

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

On this date, June 27, 2018

South Korea 2, Germany 0

I sat down to watch this game with pretty much no expectations.  With two losses already, South Korea was pretty much done already, but thanks to the low-scoring in the Group of Death™ they were still mathematically alive.  They just needed Mexico to blank Sweden, and to win their third game against Germany; you know, the defending World Cup winners, by at least a two-goal margin, to cover the differential.

Frankly, after their pitiful performance against Sweden, I stated that all I really wanted to see was for Korea to score a single goal, so that they didn’t go home after being blanked the entire time they were in Russia. 

They got their goal against Mexico, but I wasn’t satisfied by it.  It happened in the 93rd minute of the game, when Mexico was already up 2-0, so to me, it’s basically was a meaningless pity-fuck of a goal that happened long after Mexico had already begun the victory party.  However, it turned out to be an important goal nonetheless, because, due to the low-scoring of the group as a whole, goal differential turned out to be a big deal going into the final games of groups.

Basically, Germany wins and they’re in.  However, too many goals by Sweden would make things murky, as would too many goals by Mexico.  And despite the fact that they were dead last in the group, too many goals by Korea would actually have some impact on the standings as well.

Continue reading “O PILSUNG COREA MOTHERFUCKERS” →

I wish I could have Seoul searched in Seoul

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Until it streams online, it’s new to me.  I just recently watched on Netflix, the film Seoul Searching, apparently released back in 2015.  Long story short, it’s basically Breakfast Club for Koreans, and there’s no mistaking the immense John Hughes influences throughout the entire film.

Instead of in-school Saturday suspension, the story takes place in 1986, where a bunch of Korean teenagers who grew up outside of Korea are brought to Seoul to participate in a government-sponsored summer camp where foreign-born Koreans have the opportunity to learn about the cultures of their parents’ native land.  The tropes are broad and prevalent, but there’s still a diverse cast of characters from the misfits, the jarhead, the adoptee, the tomboy, and the most mind-blowing to me, the Koreans from countries such as Mexico and Germany.

Now I know that quite a few of them exist in the world, but it really isn’t until you hear the accents and behaviors does it really sink in that Koreans did in fact immigrate to countries other than America, seeing Koreans ripping perfect German or Spanish with names like Sergio and Klaus.

Ultimately, it’s a film that obviously hits home pretty hard for me, given my circumstances as an American-born Korean.  I feel like if when I was a teenager, I probably would have rolled my eyes and loathed the opportunity to go to Korea to learn about my heritage, much like most of the characters of this film were like.  But as an adult, it’s all too easy for me to say that I wished that such a government-sanctioned and probably extremely affordable opportunity to go visit Korea still existed, for adults, like me, and that I wouldn’t hesitate for a moment to be all over it. 

Continue reading “I wish I could have Seoul searched in Seoul” →

Is this really happening?

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Throughout my entire life, the Koreas have been at war.  The same can be said about just about all of my peers, friends and acquaintances.  Obviously, this doesn’t mean that there’s always been continuous combat for 36 years, but in the technical terms of the Korean Armistice Agreement of 1953, the fighting may have ceased, but the Korean War had never ended.  It’s safe to say that large chunks of the world’s populations have never known of a world where the Koreas have not been at war.

So it’s kind of surreal, almost strange, and definitely unbelievable the recent news of North Korea’s Kim Jong-Un meeting with South Korean president Moon Jae-In, and coming to terms and signing a peace treaty declaring a formal end to the Korean War.  It’s treading into waters that most of the world has never seen before, and it’s kind of amazing to think that babies born beyond April 27, 2018 will be coming into a world where the Korean War was not technically happening.

Seeing as how I am American by birth, and as authentically Korean as a Hyundai assembled in Mexico, I’m a little surprised at how much the news of the Koreas ceasing the war affected me.  I’ve only been to Korea twice, and know a pathetically paltry amount of the history of my ancestors.  Yet, reading news and progressions of the peace summit at Panmunjom really made me feel genuine hope, positivity and a swelling of emotion from within that I think I can only really explain as a result of my Korean heritage.

I know there are tons of people who are skeptical and untrusting of North Korea, and I’m most certainly not without my own skepticism and conspiracy theories of what might actually be in the works.  There are allegations that North Korea really fucked up on a missile test and took down a mountain, destroyed a major developmental facility, nuclear fallout, or all of the above.  There are theories that the escalating trade tensions between the United States and China have unintentionally begun to choke out North Korea’s primary trade partners, thus making them suffer, forcing them to become desperate and take these measures.  Both are somewhat logical and justifiable to why seemingly out of the blue, North Korea has been open to meeting with South Korea.

Continue reading “Is this really happening?” →

More skeptical than optimistic

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

When news breaks about how North Korea and South Korea are considering a peace treaty, there are a myriad of thoughts that swirl through my head.  Considering when I was born as well as the vast majority of the people I know, we have pretty much only known a world where the Koreas are at war.  Sometimes, I’m surprised how many people don’t actually know that the Korean War never technically ended, and that it’s only through the Armistice Agreement in the 50’s that they aren’t physically fighting to this day, but then again considering this isn’t information so readily available on Reddit, Facebook or Twitter, I can’t really say that I should be that surprised.

But although peace is ultimately a worthy end goal for warring nations, I can’t help but be skeptical about it instead of as optimistic as I probably should be, especially as a person with Korean blood running through my veins.  I attribute it to a lifetime raised by television, movies, video games, comic books and professional wrestling that I’m quicker to question the legitimacy of two parties willing to come to a truce, than be pleased to see the progression towards peace.

Frankly, the most dubious of factors is the fact that it wasn’t even a full year ago that tyrannical Kim Jong-Un was basically mouthing off about how he could blow up the United States any time he wanted to, successfully baiting the cheeto-in-chief into a childish Twitter war.  I have a hard time believing that a guy who is one, well known for his general instability, that must be genetic, considering who his dad was, and two, someone who has been vocal about his disdain for the United States, to be so suddenly willing and accommodating towards the progression towards a peace treaty with a South Korea that is pretty comfortable with their positive relationship with the United States.

I get that North is in a precarious position where they’re basically disliked by most other countries in the world, and would probably be a unanimous public enemy #1 if the Middle East didn’t exist.  And as a result, life is kind of difficult for them on a regular basis, what with the country routinely not having nearly enough food for their people, and a laughably inadequate distribution of resources between regular people and those controlled by the government.  From an outsider perspective, it looks like to me that North’s biggest reasons to strive for peace is so that they can possibly get in on the global trade market that might make life in North Korea not quite as hard as it seems to be on a routine basis.  As it stands now, it’s my understanding that the vast majority of their trade comes almost solely from China, and putting all their eggs into few baskets can’t possibly be as fruitful as putting them into more and bigger ones, in this instance.  Even if it means dismantling their nuclear program, a peace treaty would undoubtedly unlock many doors in order for them to start being able to get resources from South Korea as well as possibly even the United States.

Continue reading “More skeptical than optimistic” →

Danny’s watch list, winter-spring 2018

~ dannyhong ~ Leave a comment

Over the last few months, I’ve been watching a lot more television instead of burning every single evening playing League of Legends.  I still enjoy the game, but I’m not going to pretend like my interest in the game is nearly what it was a year or three ago; it’s kind of like how my baseball mania peaked and tempered back down a happy medium, to where I wanted to pursue other interests instead of letting myself get so completely absorbed in it.  I don’t follow professional play anymore, and I don’t even bother reading patch notes, and have gotten blindsided by some new in-game mechanics here and there, but I just don’t care. 

I could easily write more about why I’ve grown distant to the game, but that would be long enough to be another post for another time.

Television, has kind of filled the space in my free time that was so fervently accounted for by playing League.  Every now and then, I feel like I’m falling behind the ever-growing libraries of content being produced at a breakneck pace, and sometimes I just want to sit back and watch something and not be so interactively vested in my entertainment.  Sometimes it’s just nice to have stories told to you, without having to exert any more effort than pulling the tab on my recliner to sit back and enjoy television on my projection screen.

Continue reading “Danny’s watch list, winter-spring 2018” →