The Birth of Korean Cool by Euny Hong Read Free Book Online Page A

and this is one of them: The idea that the
process of learning is somehow supposed to be fun. Just drop it. Forget it. What is fun is the result of learning—the infinite amount of fun when you finally put the finished product to
use.”
    That said, I disagreed with my Korean teachers as to what kinds of information need to be committed to memory. For example, I don’t think it was really necessary to make us memorize the
Beaufort wind scale, which is a nineteenth-century method of measuring wind speed, on a seventeen-point scale, by how choppy the water is. That was in seventh or eighth grade. Unless you are a
sailor with not even the most basic technology for measuring wind speed, you will never, ever need to use this. And if you do need to use it, you can probably look it up. Like, in a book or on a
computer.
    We also had to learn a rock density scale by heart. For example, limestone’s density ranges from 1.93 to 2.90g/cm 3 ; the exam tested our knowledge on such data for a dozen or so
other rock types. I’m sure this information will come in handy the next time I find myself trapped in a limestone quarry.
    My memorization skills were so well honed at Korean school that it’s now become an involuntary and automatic reflex. I have almost perfect recall of conversations I’ve had going back
about twenty years or so. If required, I can recite an entire thirty-minute exchange verbatim. Sometimes this is useful, as when I’m arguing with a male companion about whether one of us did
or did not break some previously made promise. However, my gift of recall is very annoying to other people. They forgot to tell us at Korean school that memory does not lead to a happy life.
    Annoying or not, being trained in rote memorization, along with discipline, obedience, worship of authority, and good old-fashioned terror of failing is one of the cornerstones of Korea’s
accelerated success.
    Cosmetically, a lot has changed in Korean schools. Class sizes are a great deal smaller—around thirty-two students; in my day, it was sixty. Corporal punishment is gone. Schoolrooms
actually turn on their electric lighting. Most schools reintroduced uniforms, ending the open-attire policy of my day, which was really fortunate, since the latter was a charade. All students,
regardless of gender, take both home economics and technology. Korea was the first nation in the world to install Internet access in 100 percent of all primary, middle, and high
schools. 8 The surprise inspections for foreign school supplies have been rendered unnecessary by Korea’s wealth, plus the fact that Korean-made
school products are now quite excellent.

4
CHARACTER IS DESTINY: THE WRATH OF HAN
· · · · · · · · · · · · · · · ·
    “[KOREANS] ARE THE CRUELEST, MOST RUTHLESS people in the world,” wrote Ian Fleming in
Goldfinger
, adding that Koreans have no
respect for human life. In this scene, the supervillain of the title is explaining to James Bond why he picked only Koreans as bodyguards, among whom is the stocky, grunting, subhuman karate expert
Oddjob, who decapitates people by hurling his razor-sharp black bowler hat at them.
    Fleming’s description of Koreans is regarded as widely racist, but my desire to be offended is contradicted by a sheepish “How did he know?” sort of feeling.
    In order to understand the Korean drive that propelled the country to wealth, you have to know that Korea has been the whipping boy of fate for five thousand years. The peninsula has been
invaded four hundred times in its history, and it has never once invaded any other nation, unless you count its participation in the Vietnam War. 1
    The result of all this abuse is a culturally specific, ultra-distilled form of rage, which Koreans call
han
. I usually find it pretentious when someone says that a particular word is
untranslatable, but
han
really is untranslatable.
    By definition, only Koreans have
han
, which arises from the fact that the