Rooting for Korea!

[Re: “Why my country should win the World Cup,” June 10]

Hello, my name is Yongwoo Lee, a Ph.D. candidate in art history and communication studies at McGill University. I’m focusing on postcolonial theories, media studies, journalism and mass communication. Since I have living in this wonderful city, your paper—Montreal Mirror—provided an affluent information regarding how to enjoy Montreal life.

Today, however, I found an rather irritating and non-sense article entitled “Why My Country Should Win the World Cup.” Since I’m originated from South Korea, reading this article makes me doubt your spirit of journalism.

First of all, this article is purely based on racial discrimination. As you may see, there is the way you sort the entry nations of FIFA World Cup 2010 qualifiers—why are the African and Asian countries solely mentioned as a continent? If you want to talk about the all qualifiers, you should’ve mentioned each and every country in a fair base. However, your paper sorts them as (a) West Africa (Cameroon, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria), (b) East Asia (North Korea, South Korea, Japan).

Second, I am deeply disappointed about how so-called columnist Raf Katigbak mentioned about why South Korea has to win. I bet if you were Koreans, you could not just ignore concerning this ignorant article. He says, “Seriously, what do we know about Korea? Their writing has really bubbly looking characters, they put squid in their pancakes and I think they were in some war at some point. They’ve been so obsessed with being in the shadow of the other Asian nations that they’ve even tried to claim they invented sushi and Chinese mythology.”

As far as I’m concerned, I’ve never heard about this type of ignorance on Korea. If you don’t know about the country, you basically have to research to convey the right information. You can say that this article was written as a pure sense of humour, or just for fun. But if Koreans read this article feeling bad about it, then this is not a joke at all.

Your so-called columnist wants to be like so chic and cool, since he designates himself as “actually the whitest person,” he thinks he can mock any country in Asia without a proper intelligence and manner.

I personally do not think he has any qualification to write a FIFA World Cup article. I sincerely hope that you consider this matter deeply and wouldn’t hurt any minority living in Montreal further.

>> YONGWOO LEE

I just can’t figure out why your article is full of bulls***. Is this coming from jealousy or pure ignorance or perhaps an inferior complex?

Maybe you’re too Canadian than Filipino now, you don’t know what’s going on back in your home country. Ask your Filipino cousins what they think about “Winter Sonata” or “Super Junior” or “LG” or “Samsung.” They can give you more information about Korea.

Or you can simply hop in a flight and make some trips to another continent rather than North America, because it will enlighten you that the world you live in is not the all. There is more than you think outside of your box.

I think you should be ashamed to write this article because I can’t even take it as a joke. If it is a joke, it is bad and trashy one.

Thank you and enjoy the World Cup. Too bad Canada or Philippines aren’t playing. But you’re always welcome to cheer for Korea. :)

Sincerely and graciously,

>> SOO YEON CHO

Hello! Not only am I Korean Canadian but also I am a soccer fan. I have found that the article is very disrespectful and subjective in terms of describing Korean culture. I wonder whether Katigbak is resentful of Korean people or he wishes to make fun of a minor ethnic group in order to make major ethnics have fun.

Personally, I have a couple of homosexual friends in Korea, and they seem to be very well accepted. Besides, I have never been aware of Koreans claiming to invent sushi or Chinese mythology. We Koreans have our own cuisine and Korean mythology, and they are unique and different. 

Yes, Korean people call cellular phones “handphones.” However, let’s not forget that Korea makes so-called “handphones” and sells them worldwide. The Korean cell phone company, Samsung, makes No.1 sales in Canada. I guess it is the time for every nation to call a cell phone a “handphone.” 

Best wishes,

>> HEESEUNG KO

I can say that I am a big fan of Mirror newspaper. However, when I read the article about South Korea, I am very angry. It was so ridiculous and racist. Has Raf Katigbak never heard of such Korean products as Samsung, LG, Hyundai or KIA? I do not know what this motherfucker’s homeland country making.

Perhaps, banana?

>> HEE JAE SHIN

Hi, I read the articles and laughed my ass off. But how could you leave out Argentina???

>> MARTINA DENIS

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