tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-268789363253190247.post6889732963190539495..comments2023-06-25T18:01:34.208+09:00Comments on Busan Mike / 부산 마이크: Under Siege: Come On! Come On!Mikehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15349691823513127693noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-268789363253190247.post-84528811400766870912012-06-24T08:59:51.518+09:002012-06-24T08:59:51.518+09:00Hi Simon,
Congratulations on the birth of your so...Hi Simon,<br /><br />Congratulations on the birth of your son! It would certainly be great to meet up with you sometime - but don't worry; I understand the time issue. My son got sick for a while after Christmas and I think it was about two months before I spoke to any of my friends again.<br /><br />I don't get much time to read blogs but I still read yours even though it's a kind of torture - which I mean in a nice way as I'm sure you understand ;-)<br /><br />'두쉬백' is now my 'Korean word' of the day - thanks for that :-)Mikehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15349691823513127693noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-268789363253190247.post-19738346407671058412012-06-23T23:54:11.141+09:002012-06-23T23:54:11.141+09:00웥아두쉬백 :p웥아두쉬백 :pSimon Daveyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10713922545631951771noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-268789363253190247.post-92100392060456843682012-06-23T23:47:20.650+09:002012-06-23T23:47:20.650+09:00Hi Mike! Good to see you posting again..... I'...Hi Mike! Good to see you posting again..... I've been busy with my 4 month old son so am just catching up on them all .... and you were right don't have time but mostly no energy to study Korean (sorry anonymous) now that my little boy is here.<br />Also I would like to meet you one day... though these days are a blur of work/baby/broken sleep.Simon Daveyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10713922545631951771noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-268789363253190247.post-56005376302012014992012-06-23T22:22:09.637+09:002012-06-23T22:22:09.637+09:00You said ‘it is sad to see you can barely say a fe...You said ‘it is sad to see you can barely say a few sentences in the language’ and that my tables-turned Korean equivalent in the UK ‘can barely speak any English’. My Korean vocabulary is about 900 words. You added that it is ‘even sadder that you justify yourself by saying some Westerners fluent in the language told you it was a waste of time to learn it’. Everyone who knows me knows that I am trying to learn even though progress – as seen with the meter at the bottom of all my posts – is slow. I am aware that some fluent in Korean feel that the investment isn't worth the return, and I have mentioned this fact, but I clearly choose to continue anyway. What choice is there?<br /><br />I don’t care about your hypothetical Korean in the UK anyway. He can write what he likes for me – it’s a free country and he should be free to write about his experiences. Is it OK for 'shit' happen to him because he isn't fluent in English? That's a pretty unpleasant view to hold as it seems to condone racism. I think your criticisms of my criticism would be more justified if I wrote a critical meta-commentary blog like Gusts of Popular Feeling or The Grand Narrative – but I’m not interested in turning my personal blog into criticisms of things which don’t directly affect me. When I have negative personal experiences in Korea in a blog about personal experiences which do affect me, it’s not balanced not to write about them.<br /><br />What I’ve written here is the truth of who I am and I accept that for all the flaws that it portrays, and I have flaws there’s no doubt. Come back and read what you’ve written here from time to time if you dare – that’s the truth of who you are. Are you really a better man than me as you would have me believe?<br /><br />Have a nice life, and I hope you don’t develop Meniere’s Disease or anything else that fundamentally changes your enjoyment of it.<br /><br />MikeMikehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15349691823513127693noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-268789363253190247.post-59828272488263124262012-06-23T22:21:38.570+09:002012-06-23T22:21:38.570+09:00Hello Anonymous,
My blog has always been about my...Hello Anonymous,<br /><br />My blog has always been about my experiences, good and bad. In the last year I’ve had some negative experiences including a little racism, and recently I have written about these. I believe a reasonable person reading these entries would be clear that aside from the one you’ve chosen to post about, none were related to my Korean language ability.<br /><br />Occasionally with this blog someone will come along with abusive language dressed up as advice and no matter how eloquently or otherwise they write these can always be summarised as ‘shut up and stop complaining’. I believe it isn’t ‘pathetic’ as you put it to write about negative experiences as well as positive ones. It’s honest.<br /><br />I don’t know why some people are so hell-bent on curtailing the free speech of others in this world. Is it just a simple need for self-validation or something more complex? They always write anonymously – perhaps if they didn’t we’d read their blogs and find out if they are really as superficially positive as they would apparently have others be, or whether they are real people too.<br /><br />The paradox is of course, you claim to be a positive person, and you’re posting negative things on my blog – so apparently you’d defend your right to be critical – just not mine.<br /><br />It’s true I suffer from depression sometimes, which is in large part due to suffering from Meniere’s Disease – something I have written about on this blog a number of times. I think you should try living this way before telling me and others with this condition what our mental state should be – I know you don’t have it because you say you enjoy travelling a lot. Some people with the severity of my condition end up on disability and this was an option offered to me once but I refused it because I'm a fighter. So before you suggest ‘trying to focus a bit more on the positive side of life’, I’d ask you to consider the possibility that you really don’t understand how I got to this place or what on Earth you are talking about.<br /><br /><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%A9ni%C3%A8re's_disease" rel="nofollow">Meniere's Disease</a><br /><br />Now apart from being insulting and insensitive your comments were also ultimately dishonest, wilfully or through ignorance. You said ‘the only thing you manage to write on your blog is concerning negative experiences’. This is verifiably untrue, and in fact you mention my humour which I think demonstrates that when negative things happen I generally tend to get funny rather than angry. I’m not even angry at you, although I think I should be. I view your words with a kind of detached bemusement and a great example of kind of sheer nastiness directed at foreign bloggers in Korea by other foreigners sometimes.Mikehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15349691823513127693noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-268789363253190247.post-79510977132445127582012-06-23T15:33:23.231+09:002012-06-23T15:33:23.231+09:00Hello Mike,
I'm sorry to bother you with my c...Hello Mike,<br /><br />I'm sorry to bother you with my comment, but I've been reading your blog for a few weeks and I must say that although you are a very talented writer, I truly feel saddened by the fact that the only thing you manage to write on your blog is concerning negative experiences in Korea (and England to a lesser extent).<br /><br />By your own admission you are a depressed person; I would suggest trying to focus a bit more on the positive side of life, whether in Korea or in any other country. There is no country in the world where one will feel everything is perfect. I enjoy traveling a lot, as well as living in different places. I could easily focus on all the negative things or experiences that I have seen/undergone in all the places I've been. But I choose to focus on all the good things that I've experienced. This makes for better memories, and it makes me happier and makes life all around more enjoyable.<br /><br />I'm sorry but I simply find it pathetic that you, just as apparently so many Westerners in Korea or in many other countries, focus strictly on negative experiences and even take the time to share these with everyone. I first started to read your blog because of your writing skills and peculiar humor, but you so pathetically insist on writing about shit that happens to you that I feel like I don't have anything more to read from your blog. <br /><br />My advice is as follow: start to learn Korean seriously (to be honest, after living in Korea for so long it is sad to see you can barely say a few sentences in the language, and even sadder you justify yourself by saying some Westerners fluent in the language told you it was a waste of time to learn it), get out of your little box and start meeting some nice people (this includes Koreans), stop bragging about the fact that you've never taught English in Korea (seriously, what's the big deal, and who cares?), stop focusing on all your negative experiences--perhaps there lay the cure to your depression, and start doing something interesting out of your life so that perhaps you have something better to write about.<br /><br />If we turn the tables around, and we look at a hypothetical Korean who's been living in the UK for 5 years and can barely speak English, and he constantly complain about how the UK sucks, how his life is miserable, and how shit happens to him all the time, but anyway he's never at fault because learning English is kind of a waste of time and he has better things to do anyway (such as writing a blog about shit that happens to him), what would you think about that person?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com