In 1910, Korea lost its independence. Japan ruled the country for 36 years. Korea tried to recover its freedom. Many patriots were put in prison. Seo-dae-mun priso n was the biggest prison at that time.
▣ Independence Gate
The Independence Gate was built in 1896 as a symbol of independence.
People donated money to build it. It was modeled after the “Arch of Triumph” in Paris. Japan built the Seo-dae-mun prison next to the gate.
They wanted Koreans to stop think ing about independence.
▣ Korean Independence Movement
One of the most famo us resistance demonstratio ns was the March 1s t Movement. Thirty-three leaders declared Korea’s independence at
Pagoda Park in 1919. More than 2 million people jo ined and shouted
“Dae-han-min-guk-man-se (Long Live Korea).” Many people were arrested and put in prison. Yu Gwan-sun, Han Yong-un and many other patriots died in the prison. However, Koreans did not give up. They set up a provisio nal go vernment in Shanghai. Korea finally wo n back its independence in 1945. Resistance Room This room tells us the historical background of Seo-dae-mun prison. We can also learn about resistance history. There is a screen that shows the Kang, woo-kyu bombing
at the Japanese governor-general building. Torture Room This room displays the cruel tortures done by the Japanese. There is an actual roo m
where real atrocities occurred. The basement priso n was built to put fema le freedom fighters. This place is also known as Yu Gwan-Sun’s cave.
**** Who is Yu, Gwan-sun?Yu Gwan-sun was a famous female freedom fighter. In 1919, she was a student at Ehwa Wo men's School. She returned to her ho metown
because the Japanese government ordered to close all the schoo ls.
She planned a jo int demo nstratio n wit h other towns. It started on the 1st of March in 1919, at the A-woo-nae Marketplace. Yu was arrested and impriso ned in the Seo-dae-mun prison. Even while in prison, she cont inued to protest for the independence of Korea. So she rece ived harsh beat ings and was tortured. She died in prison in 1920, at the age of 18.
Prison Buildings
These are the prison cells where our patriots were locked up. The rooms are dark and damp wit h no toilets. Many people died of hunger and disease in here. Execution Building This is where the executions were
carried out. There is a chair and thick rope for hanging. Next to this build ing, there is a secret tunnel for carrying dead bodies. This place reminds us of the sacrifices made by our freedom fighters. Tae-guek-gi The Korean nat io nal flag is called Taeguekgi. It is known that King Go jong the 26t h king of Joseon dynasty drew it. It has many meanings. The circ le in the center is divided into two parts. It symbolizes the harmony of two opposite forces such as sun & moon, man & wo man, heat & cold etc.It’s fro m the yin and yang theory (oriental philo sophy). The lines at each corner represent the four universal elements : heaven, earth, sun, and moo n. It also represents four seasons :spring, summer, fall & winter or
the direct ions : east, west, south and north .
MugungwhaThe nat io nal flo wer of Korea is the Mugungwha (Rose of Sharon). The flo wer bloo ms everywhere in Korea and lasts lo nger than other flowers.
It symbo lizes pat ience and endurance. National Anthem Korea’s nat ional ant hem is called Ae-guk-ka, which means “Song o f Love for the Country.”
We are not sure who wrote the lyrics. We had different versio ns o f this song for many years. Composer Ahn, Ik-tae wrote the music in 1937.
The Republic o f Korea adopted this song as the national anthem after the liberation from Japan.
Lyrics
Until the day when t he East Sea's waters are dry
and Mt. Baek-du are worn away,
God will protect us, lo ng live Korea!
Thousands miles of splendid rivers and mountains, filled
with Roses o f Sharon
People of Korea! Let’s preserve this land forever!
Japanese Colonial Government
After the Han-il mergence, Japan established a powerful colonial government to intervene in Joseon. Japanese led the destruction of our unique culture and took over our economy such as land, property, resources. Establishment of the Provisional Government After the 3.1 Movement, the national liberation leaders were organized in Shanghai and established the provisional government to resist against Japanese occupation. They resisted until August.15 liberation until 1945.
--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--▣--
My Opinion
When a country invades another country, should the aboriginal people resist forever or stop resisting at some point? It's possible that a country could have freedom after resisting for a while but in my Opinion, I think people need to stop the resisting at some point for their goods.
I think with resisting, there is two options. Either resist forever and get killed or even though it would be harsh stay where you are and live. If a country resist forever, there is a greater chance of getting attacked and killed because force and millitary are the best way to stop the resist but if the people don't resist, there wouldn't be as much as people suffering. Yes, there would be people who become slaves but isn't it better to gain your life? Though the citizens will no more be a citizen of the country, the people don't have to give up there lives for an indepence that nobody knows when it'll come or even If it actually comes. The innocent citizens don't have any relation with the invasion it self and they shouldn't sacrifice there precious lives.
Related to what I learned today at Seodaemun Prison History Hall, just like we resisted a while to Japanese , the aboriginal people have resisted a while back in history. Even though we can't turn the history up side down, it was a great oppotunity to think about the resisting deeply.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Monday, January 31, 2011
Book Review-The Odyssey
이번 겨울방학 동안 나는 캠프에 갔다 오게 되었다. 생각보다 힘들지만 그곳에서 꽤 알찬 방학을 보냈다. 그 캠프에서 책 한 권을 받게 되었는데 그 책의 이름이 오디세이이다. 물론 나에게는 한참이나 어렵고 이해하기 힘든 책이지만 그래도 누구나 한번쯤은 읽어봐야 하는 책이고 그렇기 때문에 한번 도전해 보았다. 오디세이도 누가 번역을 하느냐에 따라서 책의 내용과 스토리가 달라지는 법이다. 나는 호머(Homer)가 쓴 원작 오디세이를 똑같이 번역한 책을 읽었다. 물론 대부분이 이해가 가지 않는 내용들이었다. 한참을 생각하고 어렸을 때 읽었던 그리스 로마신화를 떠올리면서 읽어야만 조금이나마 이해가 갔다. 오디세이는 그리스의 영웅인 오디세우스의 길고 험난했던 모험(여행?)을 뜻하는 말로 이 책 오디세이는 오디세우스가 트로이 전쟁을 마치고 이타카(Ithaca)로 돌아가는 도중에 일어난 모든 일들을 엮은 책이라고 할 수 있다. 트로이 전쟁은 10년 동안이나 계속되었고 오디세우스는 10년 동안 바다를 떠날 수 없었다. 바다의 신 포세이돈의 원한을 산 오디세우스는 스킬라, 카리브디스를 비롯한 바다의 괴물들에게서 병사들을 잃고, 키르케와 칼립소를 비롯한 여신들에게서 수많은 구혼을 받았다. 10년동안 오디세우스만이 고생을 한 것은 아니다. 오디세우스의 아내 페넬로페는 많은 남자들에게 구혼을 받으며 지내왔고 아들 텔레마코스는 아버지 오디세우스를 찾기 위해 많은 노력을 해왔다. 한 사람만이 아닌 한 가족을 힘들게 한 그 10년 동안을 그린 책이 바로 오디세이라고 할 수 있겠다. 이 책은 호머뿐만 아니라 이 책을 쓴 그 당시 사람들의 가치관과 여자들을 보는 시각을 잘 알 수 있는 책이었다. 책에 담겨 있는 괴물들이 가지고 있는 뜻 하나하나를 추측할 수 있고 당시 사람들의 바램을 잘 알 수 있는 책이다. 제우스는 그리스로마 신화의 최고의 신이라고 할 수 있다. 이것으로 보아 그 당시 사람들은 자신의 조상을 최고로 여기며 매우 뿌듯하게 생각한다는 것을 알 수 있다. 마치 우리나라의 조상을 단군인 것처럼 말이다. 비록 영어로 읽어서 훨씬 어려웠다고 생각 할 수도 있겠지만 한글로 읽던 영어로 읽던 받는 감동은 같을 것이라고 생각한다. 호머는 아주 오래전 사람인데도 불구하고 어떻게 그런 발상을 가지고 책을 썼는지 참 의아하다. 방학처럼 시간이 많을 때 다른 친구들도 한번쯤 읽어봤으면 하는 책이다.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Out My Window
ONE HIGHRISE, EVERY WINDOW, A DIFFERENT CITY
Do you know where this quote came from? One highrise, every window, a different city. You probably do not know. This is from the site called "Highrise". This site is one of the world's first interactive 360˚ documentaries. Each film is told by the people who look out on the world from high rise windows. From this site, everyone can chose different person in different places and explore them. The person that I chose to explore was a baby girl from Bangalore. Her name is Akshadha. By watching these three short films, I found a lot of differences and also similarities with her life comparing to mine. First, I will talk about her life and her highrise then I will compare and contrast with mine.
A little girl Akshadha lives in Bangalore in India. Her and her parents live in a gated highrise community. From their high rise, they see the monkeys going across the fense. Unlike Korea, they can also see the train going by infront of their house. Also the parent's office could be seen from the windows.
In the country India, there are many people who work in the complex but people also have a dhobi who does laundry and irons their clothes in the basement parking lot. Dhobi is the Hindi word for laundry washer. Akshadha's parents worked there for a year. They work full days on Saturdays and Sundays too. They usually arrive at 7 in the mornings and leave at 8 in the evenings. Akshadha's mother works 2 days at home bringing clothes to wash at home. So that's 6 days for her. For every 3 buildings, there are usually 1 dhobi. There is not much washing to do because it's mostly ironing. The mother do washing at home to reduce the amount of work. The family live in Belathur in India and it's not very far to the hospitals. Prior to this, the mother used to work at the Sai Baba Hospital doing the same work, that is "Dhobi" doing laundry and then later on in Vaidehi Hospital. But in both places, she worked for the doctors and staff of the hospitals not the patients. There was an economic IT boom in Bangalore but has not touched Vishwarama(mother)'s wages. She earned no less, no more and it's the same as before. Still, she enjoyed being in that place and doing the job.
There are place called 'Ghost building'. This building is an issue in Bangalore because of the recession. All the builders have stopped building. So all of them are in a halt now. All the builders are out of money because of the expensive steel prices and cement prices. No construction is going on right now. Now I would like to compare and contrast with Akshadha's life and mine. First, there is one dhobi in every 3 buildings which shows the cultural differences and our house design is like Han-ok. In Korea, the apartments usually all look the same with no differences but in my house, most of our furniture are made of wood making it to look like Korean traditional house Han-ok.
From watching these short films, I found some similarities and differences between the little girl Akshadha and me. I learned that even though we are all living in a high rise, the environment is very different for each everyone and the culture difference.
History-Circe
Circe
Park Jong Ae
Class 26
Jan.20.2011
[About Circe]
• Goddess and enchantress • Turns men into animals
• The daughter of Perse and Helios • Fell in love with Odysseus
• Lived in island Aeaea[Story of Circe & Odysseus]
When Odysseus came to Circe’s island, she invited the crew and turned them into swines with magic. With the help of magic herb given by Hermes, Odysseus managed to drink the poison without turning into swine. Circe was very surprised because nothing happened to Odysseus. When Circe was defense-less, Odysseus threatened Circe by placing sword to her throat. By doing this Circe turned his crew back to men and they all stayed with her for a year.
[Personality]
• beautiful • cruel
• craving* for love • lonely
• treacherous*
[Represent/Symbol]
• A woman who is jealous and wants love
• A solitary person
[Perspective of Woman]
Woman • who threatens man’s spirit
• who lures man
Diary-11th Day in GLPS
Today, I messed up really bad. It was our history presentation and I screwed up. I thought I had everything ready to present but Mr. Ganse said that the cotent had little mistakes. Even though he said little, my grade went down so badly. I was in the second place for last presentation but I was really shocked to get the scores. I had everything ready; I typed my presentation, made hand outs, made more eyecontact and presented with confidence compared to the last presentation which I finished my handouts a day before the presentation. I was so nervous that my voice was shaking and I made the content as I wet through because I ahd no time to prepare. Julie and Lily are in my room. Julie has gone down like me but Lily has gone up so much that she's having the best day ever so far. I guess i just need to put more effeort to it even though I prepared the most among us three. I guess I couldn't keep my premise from last week's diary about doing better ㅠㅠ
Diary-11th Day in GLPS
KMLA has a rule banning all the relationship with their opposite sex. Guys can't ask girls to go out nor can they hold hands. I think this is ridiculous rule. I've never been to a school that bans relationship. I understand that it causes students to not actually concentrate on their school work but I think meeting a girl or a boy is also a learning that schools can't cover. Our debate TA said that he had a girlfriend in America. He told us that she is a year younger than him and that she's pretty but he didn't show us her picture so I don't know for sure. But the thing that I'm mostly curious about is his name. I wanted to write his name earlier but I couldn't because I din't know how to. I wonder if it's 한창희, 한창의, 한창이 or 한창히 or whatever. I think it's the first one though..^^ Anyways, we found out that 이윤정PA also has a boy friend. I think even if the school makes a policy, it's unstoppable. School shouldn't be resonsible for students liking each other. I think school should just be a place for education. My mom also said that she is totally fine with me having boyfriend if he is tall enough^^. Someone in our room also likes some other guy and I think people should have experience like this to have more comfortable relationship in the future with anybody.
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