North and South Korea

Since I had several people asking me about yesterday's artillery fire between North and South Korea, I figured I'd make a short blog entry about it.

Yesterday, the teachers' office remained full after the last bell (something that never happens), as everyone gathered around the room's single TV set to watch coverage of the fires on Yeonpyeong island. I didn't even realize we had a TV in there until then. Su-jin told me that things were "not good," and there was a generally solemn air. But after that, we went home, went out to eat, went to sleep, and came to school the next day. Life as usual.

Although the attack is considered the most serious aggression between the Koreas since the Korean War, there is currently no fighting going on, nor are there any plans to fight. Pretty much everyone involved wants peace, so there is pressure on all sides to patch things up. There are actually relatively regular clashes between the two Koreas, which are usually meant to serve some political purpose and keep North Korea on the map. I'm no political relations expert, nor am I Korean, and I can't really pretend to know all the details, so I won't. Although I encourage curious people to read up on it; it's actually really interesting stuff!

I did have some interesting conversations about it today with friends, co-teachers, and a student. Reactions varied a lot from people like my student, Hye-eun, who was really worried about the effect a war would have on the Korean people and the possibility of unification (which she is for), and Mr. Lim, who laughed and maintained that North Korea was only posturing and can't afford a war. Although there are plenty of views on the matter, there is currently nothing going on here and our lives haven't been affected. With luck, it'll stay that way.