Siksa Yejeol (Korean Table Etiquette)

My love for Korean cuisine started with my uncle, who had lived in Seoul for a couple of years. His ramen recipe was the best! This year I would love to try out some restaurants too, but it's not usually fun alone.

[Speaking of Hansik, if you are a big fan of Korean food I really recommend the drama ''Let's Eat''! It stars Yoon Dojoon (Highlight/B2ST|) and idk, I just love him as an actor! But the drama focuses a lot on food and there are so many scenes where they are just eating delicious dishes. I haven't watched Season 2 because Season 1 was just so perfect.]
 

Anyways, back on topic. This week's homework at the K-pop academy is about Hansik and table manners. If you ever dreamed to visit Korea someday, knowing the language may not be enough. Knowledge about culture and etiquette is a must if you want to make a good impression.
It's all a matter of respect for others really, and the rules are quite straightforward!

K-Pop Academy Week #3: Korean Cuisine - Hansik

[I missed last week's lessons about Pansori due to the London snow disaster, lol sigh]

So this week's theme at the K-Pop Academy was about food (Hansik)!!!


Now, when it comes to cooking, I barely know where to start. Sure, I know how to make a few items most essential for survival (aka ramen!!), but I can't even dream to be Gordon Ramsay. I would be so lost in a kitchen. Talk about foreign cuisine, ha!

My first day at the 13th Kpop Academy!

Okay, this was supposed to be two weeks ago, but I needed to catch up with deadlines and sleep. And yes that's another story. Hello!

This is a mini series of blog post, documenting my experience with the 13th Kpop Academy at the Korean Culture Centre UK.

I would like to start by saying how excited I am to be part of this journey! Being a huge fan of kpop and the Korean culture, this is a big opportunity to learn more about the country aside from its pop culture. But it was also nice to meet other people from the same fandom. (SOO MANY ARMIES, BLESS YOU!)😍

We started the first lesson with mini-introductions to get to know each other and share a bit about how we got here. For my presentation, I talked about how I got into Kpop because of B2ST/Highlight, how I became fascinated with the culture because of my uncle's stories (he lived in Seoul for a few years), and the K-dramas that I love.

Then we moved to the lesson of the day: a look into the Hallyu effect and influence of the Korean music industry, delivered by Dr. Haekyung Um.
From all the other topics in the curriculum, I was especially looking forward to this one! She has so much insight into the evolution of Kpop to how it became a global phenomenon, like BTS at the Billboard, Twice killing Youtube.
We had a discussion about how much we, as fans, know and reflect on what makes Kpop stand out from Western music:

• Unlike the privilege of Western artists just going up on stage and killing it, K-pop and J-pop (and C-pop?) idols have to work so hard as trainees in different companies before they can actually debut. This can take several years of training and mastering dance, vocal, visual, language skills! 
• Every song and music video is produced with great attention to detail. Everything from the group's concept and visuals to the filmography and choreo has to be fit in with a certain aesthetic. The result is then just mind-blowing. I mean, don't we all remember the good old days making BTS music video theories? Not like it's gonna stop anytime soon...
• There are more fanservice: v-live interactions, fan-signs, etc. 
• Korean drama like ''Goblin'', with killer storyline and OSTs. 

However, with good things also have a bad side. We noted that the K-pop industry is especially competitive, to a point that the agency may start treating their idols as a marketing product. There is also a lack of emphasis when it comes to taking care of their physical and mental health during promoting period. 

There was so much that we talked about, but my words cannot bring justice to how beautifully Dr Haekyung Um described everything. As this was two weeks ago, I sadly cannot remember much. But I will be adding to this if I remember some points to add. 

Oh, and at the end, we all went home with a box of goodies! Inside there were some Korean snacks, face masks, pictures of famous landmarks, a magazine booklet and more. It was so thoughtful!

But overall, the class was fantastic. It was a well-spent Saturday for a ''me'' who promised that she will be going out more during the weekend instead of burying myself at home (tempting as that always sounds!). I, unfortunately, had to miss last Saturday's class because of snow day. 

I will be back again with another detailed post soon this Saturday. We are going to have a cooking class in Korean cuisine!

I have been so stupid

Not news. I'm sure I've talked about this somewhere before. My whole life has always revolved around one principle: Always assume the worst outcome so that you're prepared for it when it happens.

It was sort of like a self-defense barrier to me. By preparing for the worst outcome, I wouldn't be as strongly disappointed as I would be. I had called it a realistic approach to things in my life, and I would also make sure to balance out the negative and the positive aspects of every single thing I was dealing with. All this while still maintaining a neutral attitude

I can't say that this method was a bad idea though. Being a thoroughly positive person has never worked out for me, as being someone who can't handle failures and hardship well. 

Looking at the dark side is a way of looking out for myself, while thinking of the bright side gives me hope that things could get better. I am my own motor and brakes. 

The other day, however, I thought about my life a lot (as usual) in conjunction to something I learned quite recently. It'd about the Law of Attraction: which is basically a belief that you alone have the power to attract the things you desire in your life just by directing your thoughts and attitudes toward it. 

Coming back very soon

I have been out for a while and I miss writing my blog so much. I had so many excuses: I wasn't getting anywhere with my blog, very few views and followers, and lacked inspiration. I started to wonder if I should switch back to Tumblr but I like this theme so much and I worked hard on it. I guess it will be a pain to move everything to a new domain, so I suppose I will give some more time and experiment around.

Update:
so yeah, I decided to stay here. I tried making a Wordpress website it's hard to create the theme I want. I think I've grown fond of Blogger / Blogspot (whatever you call it). My reason for wanting to move was simply because I wanted to get my own domain and have more control over my contents. For now, I will just stick to building my writing style and follow my ideas rather than focusing on views and followers, even though it gets frustrating at times. Here's to hoping that the rumours that Google will shut down blogger don't come true!!

Strange times

This last few weeks I was starting to miss my Instagram account.  I love photography, and taking pictures of things like nature, sceneries, or anything I can find deep meaning to. I am used to sharing my pictures on facebook, but I was starting to thing I wanted a wider audience for my next themed-project. I had quit instagram after I lost my iPod, right on my last year of high school. So after two years I logged in for the first time. 

And well, it didn't feel very good

Day #4: Your view on Religion

This is a very sensitive topic to discuss and I'm not really the right person to write about it. But I'm just going to explain my views and experiences.
I attended a Christian school for about 6 years at a young age. There was a teacher there who had inspired to me to so many levels. He was a great role model and also believed in each of his students' potentials. He also said that religion is a ''relationship with God''. And I agree, this is what religion should be.

I know that many people nowadays prefer to not be associated with anything religious. I wouldn't call myself religious either, but I do believe in God. I don't have regular prayer times. but I always set aside my time to actually pray and talk to God about my worries and also thank Him for everything I've been blessed with. It works like meditation for me. After praying I feel more relaxed, and I get the feeling that Someone is watching over me and everything will be alright. Religion is mostly about blind, and honestly I really don't have much to say.
There are many religions out there in the world with different ideals. And also there are people from the same religion with different takes on what they believe in. I strongly believe that nobody should be discriminated for what religion they follow.

I once saw a post on Tumblr. It was a very thought-proving comic that suggested that perhaps life on Earth would have been peaceful if there were no religion. That would mean no wars nor terrorism

http://www.stanleycolors.com/2013/09/imagine-john-lennon/

A world like that is a dream come true. But I believe that we, as humans, would be lost without the guidance of a superior being. From experience, I know for a fact how lost I would be without God in life. No matter how many times I screwed up, He is the one who sends me a second chance. When I needed help, it's God who sends it. We would be nowhere without God, whether you accept it or not. I believe that we could still achieve a peaceful world like the one in the cartoon by simply being peaceful to one another. Call me naive, but it's that simple! Every kind of religion is out there, in books, media, priests sharing their spiritual message. Let each religion advertise itself. There is no need to stamp on them or alienate someone whose beliefs are different from yours. Ony children would ever feel the need to defend that their taste is better than the other children, but even they would eventually grow out of that attitude.

But you know, it's 2017. Let's start by getting discrimination out of the way, because I am sure that there is no holy rule in the world that ever said that it's okay to kill a man because they won't accept your religion. No, that's just sick!.
War and terrorism is immature and really not helping whatever cause they think they are fighting for. Although as a child I used to wonder what kind of world would it be like if we could see God and we all had the same religion? I just could not understand why there were so many religions and people believing in different gods. And I felt angry and sad when I found out that people who worshipped the ''wrong god'' would go to hell. So in what way are we supposed to actually know which is the right one? You would say your religion is right, then he would say that it's hers, and then she would disagree, and so on.

Let's love God and each other first.