What evil urologists do to you when you're knocked out

In South Korea, they measure the length of your penis and then write about it.

According to the Los Angeles Times, this is all in the name of science. Indeed, they may have discovered a link between the ratio of your index finger to your ring finger, whereby the smaller that ratio is, the larger your member would tend to be:

Dr. Tae Beom Kim, a urologist at Gachon University in Incheon, Korea, and his colleagues studied 144 men over the age of 20 who were undergoing urological surgery for conditions that do not affect the length of the penis. One member of the team carefully measured the lengths of the index and ring fingers on the subject's right hand before surgery -- left hands are thought to be more variable. A second team member then measured penis length immediately after the subject had been anesthetized. The length was measured both when the penis was flaccid and when it had been stretched as much as possible. Stretched length is thought to correlate to erect length, the team wrote. The team found that, in general, the lower the ratio of the lengths of the two fingers, the longer the stretched length of the penis.

Note: This was the first non-NSFW
picture I found on my image search
for "measuring penis length."

So... you're lying on the operating table unconscious, at your most vulnerable, and some guy (or gal) takes out the measuring tape and starts stretching out your penis to see how far it would go. Naisŭ! (And by "naisŭ," I mean "Whiskey, Tango! Frack!")

Now before you write this off as whacker quackery along the lines of blood type determining personality, bear in mind that there may be some there there:

A variety of studies suggest that the ratio of the two finger lengths is determined by prenatal exposure to sex hormones, both testosterone and estrogen. It is not unreasonable to assume that penis length might also be.

Okay, but that "not unreasonable" assumption is still an assumption.

Now, for the math-impaired out there, what they're saying is that you take the length of your right index finger (that's probably the one you use to pick your noise and for pointing, if you're not a SoKo, in which case you use your middle finger to point, which gets you in trouble when you move to, say, Compton) and divide that by the length of your right ring finger, the one that's next to your pinky.

index / ring = ?

Roughly speaking, assuming you want as long a penis as possible (though I'm guessing women who don't want their cervix constantly rammed may not share your enthusiasm), then you want the index finger to be a smaller number and the ring finger to be a larger number.

Unfortunately the article doesn't tells us what the magic numbers are for the ratio. Like, would a 1:1 correspondence of index-to-ring lead to a six-inch erect penis that is, ahem, firmly average?

Anyway, I should also point out that this is the same Gachon University that supposedly fired Gerry Bevers back in 2006 for spouting his views on Korea and Tokto (using university computers), so I guess we now know what they're doing with the money they saved.

Daily Kor for Tuesday, July 5, 2011: The mega-mecca-hub strategy

We're going into full press now in the run-up to who will get the 2018 Winter Olympics. American Olympic athlete Toby Dawson, a Korean adoptee, is shilling for Pyongchang. Even the North Koreans are holding a rally in support of Pyongchang getting the games. Oh, wait. Scratch that (story #3).

1. ROK Marine conscript on forward-deployed Kanghwa-do Island goes on shooting spree, killing four and injuring one before trying to kill himself with a grenade (Reuters, BBC, UPI, AFP, Marmot's Hole, Yonhap, Joongang Daily, Korea Times, Korea Herald, Donga Ilbo)
2. European Commission says it will give North Korea €10 million (US$14.54 million) worth of strictly monitored food aid to tackle famine (Reuters, AP via WaPo, NYT)
3. 100 thousand students, soldiers, and officials gather in Pyongyang to denounce South Korea's Lee government (AP via WaPo, AFP, Reuters, Yonhap, KCNA)
4. Speaking in South Africa, President Lee Myungbak says it's his "duty" to bring Winter Olympics to South Korea and create a mecca and hub for winter sports (AP via WaPo, Reuters, Yonhap)
• Pyongchang, Munich, and Annecy begin three days of frantic campaigning (AP via WaPo)
• Pyongchang cautiously optimistic (Korea Herald)
• IOC awards SBS rights to host Olympics through 2024 (AP via WaPo)
5. ROK Navy chases three suspected pirate vehicles away from South Korean commercial vessel in Somali waters (AP via WaPo, Korea Times)
6. Outspoken Hong Joonpyo elected new chair of ruling Grand National Party (Yonhap, Joongang Daily, Korea Times, Korea Herald)
7. Financial Services Commission announces plan to assess troubled savings banks in order to pick out unviable ones by late September, with warnings they could suspend more small lenders if they fail checks (Reuters, Bloomberg, Yonhap)
8. Pet store association warns of consequences from irresponsible inbreeding conducted by on-the-street pet vendors (Yonhap)

9/21 terror

The date was September 21, 2011, ten days after the 9/11 terror attacks by Islamist followers of Osama bin Laden:

Stroman was on a shooting spree, targeting people who appeared to be Muslim or of Middle Eastern descent. Stroman is due to be executed July 20; Bhuiyan, the only survivor of the attacks, is fighting to save his life.

When Stroman entered the gas station, Bhuiyan initially thought it was a routine robbery.

"I opened the cash register, offered him the cash, and requested him not to shoot me," Bhuiyan tells weekends on All Things Considered host Laura Sullivan. "In reply he asked me, 'Where are you from?' And the question seemed strange to ask during a robbery. And I said, 'Excuse me?' And as soon as I spoke, I felt the sensation of a million bees stinging my face, and then heard an explosion."

Bhuiyan required medical attention for years after the attack. The bullet hit him on the right side of the face, leaving severe injuries, particularly to his right eye.

This story was highlighted a couple weeks ago on NPR because Mr Bhuiyan is trying to save the life of his attacker:

"According to my faith in Islam, there is no hate, no killing. It doesn't allow anything like that," says Bhuiyan. "Yes, Mark Stroman did a horrible thing, and he brought a lot of pain and disaster, sufferings in my life. But in return I never hated him."

Bhuiyan has created a website called World Without Hate to educate others about hate crimes as a means of preventing them. He's also working with Amnesty International and Stroman's defense attorney, who has filed several appeals on Stroman's death sentence.

"I strongly believe executing him is not a solution. We will just simply lose a human life without dealing with the root cause, which is hate crime," Bhuiyan says. "In Islam it says that saving one human life is the same as saving the entire mankind. Since I forgave him, all those principles encouraged me to go even further, and stop his execution and save another human life."

I am strongly opposed to capital punishment, even for people we know are guilty of the crimes they've been convicted of. But were someone to kill a loved one of mine, I honestly wouldn't know how I'd feel. Here is a man whose life was forever altered when he was shot in the face by a killer who singled him out because of his looks and his faith.

Here also is a man who takes his Islamic faith and goes in a completely different direction from the hirabi who killed thousands on 9/11.

Dropping "Captain America" from Captain America (UPDATED)

source

UPDATE:
Well, it turns out that in Australia they changed one of the taglines in the trailer to make it a little less America-centric.

In the US version, it says, "Heroes are made in America." But in the South Korean trailer, it was changed to, “When evil rises, a hero will stand.”

And since the Korea-bashing kvetchpats — those who saw Paramount's Korea distributors dropping Captain America from the title as a sign that Korea is an underserving, America-hating "ally" and that the US should leave South Korea to be gobbled up by China — are nothing if not fair and balanced, then no doubt we will hear equally loud and angry criticisms of Australia, right? Right?

ORIGINAL POST:
Over at the New York Times, a media reporter tells us that South Korea is one of only three countries (Russia and Ukraine being the other two) where marketers will drop "Captain America" from the title of Captain America: The First Avenger:

South Korea is another story. Although that country is one of Hollywood’s top-performing territories, resentment about the continued presence of the United States military runs deep. Marvel and Paramount worry that those feelings are particularly strong among younger South Koreans, the ones who powered “Iron Man 2” to $27 million in ticket sales in that country last year.

Frankly, this is a journalistically lazy and highly misleading statement. A reader might get the impression that the vast majority of South Koreans feel bitter indignation toward the US military being in their country but perhaps cannot get them to leave. A lingering han moment.

In fact, there is a small segment of South Korean society that feels this way, the chinboistas, and they regularly make their views known through persistent demonstrations that also attack government and corporate policy (with some of them simultaneously overtly or covertly supporting the Pyongyang position). The majority of the population, however, feels something considerably more positive and a bit more complex.

Most South Koreans are appreciative of the US role in helping keep South Korea safe and the region stable. This is sometimes tempered, however, by annoyance when the US military or its personnel are involved in violent crimes or environmental degradation, among other things. And while that sometimes bubbles into angry sentiment amongst the general population, especially if the persistent chinboistas have done their job properly, it is mostly aimed at the individual situation and not USFK presence itself.

Any wisdom to taking "Captain America" off the title of the movie, if in fact that is a wise thing, comes from something else. In fact, there is also a longstanding and persistent impression of American arrogance (which draws resentment when it leads to, say, President Bush pushing its South Korean allies to send troops to Iraq to participate in a war most oppose), even as so many South Koreans see the United States as an ally and a country to aspire to or even stay in for a while (or permanently).

Koreans paying their W10,000 for a movie may get a little tired of seeing America always playing the triumphant victor. Look at how many blockbusters involve some theme like that: Independence Day, Pearl Harbor (though that's sorta unavoidable), even Top Gun. Even The Last Samurai requires an American to come in and tell the 19th century Japanese what's what.

And if you think it's only South Koreans who feel this way, you're sorely mistaken (I can't even count how many times I've had this conversation with my Japanese friends here in Hawaii or Korea).

But so what? South Koreans have just accepted that that's the way Hollywood works. Hollywood also self-corrects, to a degree, with movies like Fahrenheit 911, which did brisk business in Korea in the middle of the last decade. And even the Hollywood films that have an overall positive spin on America, often temper this with the downside of Washington or suburbia or whatever. In fact, that was the theme of another movie with the country's name in the title, American Beauty.

So the NYT columnist has it wrong. Iron Man 2, doesn't have $27 million in South Korean ticket sales despite resentment toward the United States military. Rather, it did well simply because it was good, and because, at heart, South Koreans are generally upbeat on the US (and maybe that's why the response is so harsh when USFK or Washington seems to do them wrong).

And it also helps when South Korea is not depicted by Hollywood as a disease-carrying backwater where Americans should feel free to have sex in Buddhist shrines. If you ever want to lose money on a picture, it's the content, not the title, that you have to worry about. I just hope the Nazi-era Captain America doesn't depict Korea as an ally of Japan. Then we'll all do just fine.

Unintentional irony

I found this December 2007 copy of Newsweek, with Senator John Edwards on the cover, while cleaning out my SUV (something I'd been delaying for the past couple semesters). It was in the lower sedimentary layers of the rear galley.

Anyway, with the knowledge we now have of the good senator's philandering ways, I just thought that the simple headline — "The Sleeper" — was full of delicious irony and prescience.

Daily Kor for Monday, July 4, 2011

Happy Independence Day, everyone who's American! And a belated Happy Dominion Day to all our Canadian readers! It's actually not quite yet July 4 here in Hawaii, so if anyone has any recommendations for me as to what to do on Oahu — capital of a former independent kingdom that was illegally absorbed by the United States and still has some people pining for restoration of the monarchy — on this day, I'd be happy to hear suggestions.

Meanwhile, chew on this: In 2007, South Korea was roundly criticized by expats (who roundly criticize South Korea for a lot of things) when it seemed to have made much of its pitch for the 2014 Winter Olympics based on an appeal for peace on the Korean Peninsula (we have that nasty neighbor to the north), but now a German reporters who is an "expert" on the Olympics, is saying that the prospect of using the Olympics for peace — which could earn the IOC a Nobel Peace Prize, he says — may be just the ticket.

I say we focus on Kim Yuna, snow, infrastructure and ease of travel, and that we don't have to worry (as much) about terrorists (I've so far avoided bringing up rival Munich's past Olympic troubles in this regard, lest I alert Karma).

1. One person has been rescued but four people are still missing after the group jumps from Shinch'ŏngp'yŏng Bridge, east of Seoul, into the swollen North Han River in an apparent suicide (AP via WaPo, Yonhap, Joongang Daily)
2. President Lee Myungbak arrives in South Africa to make final pitch for P'yŏngch'ang's bid to host 2018 Winter Olypiad (Yonhap)
• Lee rehearses speech and holds strategy meeting (Yonhap)
3. Cambodia agrees to cooperate in South Korean lending scandal that may have seen hundreds of millions of dollar hidden in that Southeast Asian country (Yonhap)
4. National Police Agency poll shows that 43.7 percent of respondents feel unsafe when walking at night (Yonhap)
5. South Korea to submit claim on continental shelf in East China Sea to United Nations (Yonhap, Reuters, Monster Island)
6. Korean base in Afghanistan hit by rocket attack (Korea Times)
7. South Korea moves up five spots to #26 in FIFA rankings (Korea Times)

8. Media celebrates fiftieth anniversary of Princess Diana's birth with contest to see who can be the most creepy (Newsweek)

A geographically muddled article on Korean dog meat consumption

In the wake of news that a dog meat festival in Seoul was canceled thanks to the efforts of animal rights activists (above), CNN has a Global Post article on the state of dog meat in East Asia. And while the article tries to helpfully present the issue, it underscores one of the major problems in discussing the topic.

Setting aside the merits of eating dog meat or eschewing it (which you can talk about to your heart's content at this go-to Ask a Korean! post or in this Monster Island post), the CNN article is quite a geographically muddled presentation of this highly contentious issue.

A Chinese animal lover consoles a dog after a convoy of trucks carrying some 500 dogs to be sold as meat, were stopped along a highway in Beijing on early April 17, 2011, and the dogs were later rescued to the China Animal Protection Association. There were about 58 million pet dogs in 20 major Chinese cities at the end of 2009 and the figure is rising about 30 percent each year, according to a survey, as pet owners in China spend an estimated two billion USD a year on their animals.

The article is purportedly about South Korea, but the picture of the abused (and finally rescued) dog CNN put up at the top of the page (above this paragraph, with original caption) is in China. Naturally, some casual readers will conflate the dog meat industry in South Korea with the abuse in China depicted in the photograph (I dare say some readers might actually think Korea is a part of China or closely tied with it).

[Please note that I'm not saying abuse of canine livestock does not occur in Korea, as I've pointed it out here and here, but judging from these pictures it appears the abuse may be different: in Korea one major type of abuse are the cramped conditions in which many are transported to market, but in China, judging from the coat of the dogs in the picture, it appears some of these animals are not well tended even when they're being raised.]

And then at the end of the article we are told we can read more on this issue at GlobalPost's Dog Meat Mafia series, which "delves into the seedy world of the booming dog meat industry in Southeast Asia" (italic emphasis mine). Again, it would seem that South Korea's meat industry has something to do with the "seedy world" of the dog meat industry in Southeast Asia. Heck, M*A*S*H itself had its characters (who you may recall were in South Korea) referring to where they were as "Southeast Asia" in early seasons, even though they are thousands of miles apart, so why not casual CNN readers?

And to top it off, a hotlink in the middle of the article abruptly invites readers to "Read North Korean propaganda," as if North Korea is somehow connected to this (indeed, one commenter jumped on the North-South connection to suggest that because Koreans eat people, it's okay to eat Koreans elsewhere). Sadly, this mistaken conflation is nothing new.

The CNN piece was just sloppy journalism. Consumption of dog meat is an emotional issue for many people, both those who are opposed to it and those who defend it. Even though dog meat is consumed in China and a number of other countries throughout Asia, the stilted way it gets discussed in global media has been twisted into a stereotype about Korea that makes it seem like a uniquely Korean issue, and the worst aspects of the industry in other countries are sometimes placed squarely on the shoulders of Korea (and its national image).

And from there it sometimes crosses from an issue of national pride to one that affects people's pocketbook. When you have emotional opponents of dog meat consumption saying they will boycott LG, Samsung, or Hyundai because of the practice, that distortion gets to be a problem, especially if they're still buying Made-in-China (Apple, Dell, just about anything in WalMart, etc.) with hypocritical glee.

Somewhere in China, in cramped dorm rooms from Dalian to Guangzhou, Chinese netizens are starting to hammer out on their keyboards that, "Now the damned Koreans are stealing our dog meat industry!"

A maritime land grab by Seoul?

The South Korean government is planning to submit to the the relevant UN agency a revised claim related to the continental shelf in the East China Sea, that body of water to the south of Cheju Island (called Namhae [남해] in Korean).

This would expand South Korea's EEZ. Not surprisingly, this might upset the neighbors:

The South Korean government will submit an official document to claim the extended EEZ portion to the U.N. Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS) by the end of this year, the Yonhap News Agency quoted an unidentified government official as saying.

"In order to submit an official document to the U.N. CLCS, the government is reviewing and processing related data," the official was quoted by Yonhap as saying.

In the document, Seoul is expected to claim that the Korean Peninsula's naturally extended continental shelf stretches to the Okinawa Trough in the East China Sea. It means the country's statutory EEZ stretches beyond the 200 nautical miles.

The disputed area in the East China Sea is believed to contain natural gas and oil deposits.

The government official was quoted as saying the formal claim to the U.N. commission this time is likely to prompt Beijing and Tokyo to take similar steps, reigniting fierce disputes among the Asian neighbors.

I just have one thing to say: Iŏdo is our land! Now if you'll excuse me, I must get to work on a song that contains those lyrics. "Bo's Best Bet" for stocks this week: any ferry company that can take you to those submerged rocks.

Daily Kor for Sunday, June 3, 2011

Owing to my jinx, I probably shouldn't pay too close attention to the announcement of who will be hosting the 2018 Winter Olympics (story #1). Through my interest back in 2007, I may have single-handledly caused Sochi to win the hosting rights (well, me and Vladimir Putin).

1. President Lee Myungbak heads to South Africa for final push for 2018 Winter Olympics hosting (Yonhap)
• Pyongchang and Munich reportedly leaders in Wednesday's vote to determine host of 2018 Winter Olympics (AP via WaPo, Korea Times)
2. Samsung drops suite against Apple that claimed the California-based company had copied the Korean electronics giant's designs (Reuters, WSJ, Bloomberg, Joongang Daily)
3. Undefeated Sweden defeats North Korea, 1-0, in Fifa Women's World Cup, moves on to semifinals (Reuters, Bloomberg, AP via WaPo, AFP, UPI)
4. At meeting of South Korean and Japanese vice foreign ministers in Tokyo, South Korea and Japan reaffirm that their strong ties are vital to stability and prosperity in Northeast Asia and the international community (Yonhap)
5. Four workers die of apparent asphyxiation in underground machine room at E-Mart in Ilsan (Yonhap)
6. North Korea says pact with Associated Press will improve relations with US (Yonhap)
7. South Korean military expands cyber warfare unit (Bernama)
8. Korea Military Academy appoints its first female civilian professor (Yonhap)
9. Chinese tourists arrive in North Korea on newly inaugurated Shanghai-Pyongyang air route (Yonhap, Korea Times, Korea Herald)
10. North Korean strongman Kim Jong-il reportedly pleased as Michael Jackson's hyperbaric chamber finally clears customs in Pyongyang (Xinhua)

Things to do this Fourth of July: Go skiing in California

That's right, you heard me: Go skiing.

The Sierra Nevada mountains got so much snow this year that it's still possible to go skiing and snowboarding up in Mammoth, not far from Yosemite National Park, where the base is still three to eight feet. I'm still on Oahu, but if I get to California and there's still snow up there, I may consider giving this a shot (though I may stick to sledding if my little relatives come along).

source

The Sierras have peaks reaching to the 14,500-foot level (Mt Whitney, which is 4500 meters), with lots of car-accessible places at 9000 or 10,000 feet, including the pass that brings you into Yosemite National Park's Tuolumne Meadows from the east. Back in August 2001, when we traveled from Death Valley to Tuolumne Meadows, in thirty-six hours we went from scorching daytime temperatures (122°F, or 50°C) at Badwater to freezing overnight temperatures (30°F, or -1°C) at the Tuolumne Meadows campsite. We were hardly prepared for either. (It was on another trip to Yosemite that on the way down from Glacier Point, at around the 7000- to 6000-foot elevation, we saw it snow on a summer day in June.)

Given their high elevation and their position vis-à-vis typical weather patterns, they tend to capture moisture and let it dump right there. It's hardly a surprise that Sierra Nevada means "snowy mountains." And it's apparently not that rare that the snow pack is till around even in developed parts of the Sierras at this time of year.

Daily Kor for Saturday, July 2, 2011 (PRELIMINARY)

I'm in the middle of a temporary move requiring me to put everything in my dorm in storage for a couple months, so this is a preliminary posting of the day's news stories, with only the overseas news bureau highlights. Later today I'll scour Yonhap and other domestic sources.

1. Korea-EU free-trade agreement goes into effect (AP via WaPo, WSJ)
2. South Korea's exports rose 14.5 percent in June from a year earlier (Bloomberg)
• South Korea raises export forecast 8.6 percent to $557 billion (Bloomberg, Reuters)
• GM-Daewoo sales up 10 percent from year earlier (Bloomberg)
• Kia Motors' sales reach 217.3K in June, up 21.8 percent from year earlier (Bloomberg)
3. Samsung announces plans to fold flat-planel display business back into semiconductor business (WSJ)
4. Lone Star gets $466 million dividend from beleaguered Korea Exchange Bank (Bloomberg)
5. Asiana Airlines to launch Seoul-Honolulu route (AP via Forbes)
• Kushibo's note: Yay!
6. North Korea assumes rotating presidency of UN nuclear disarmament group (AP via WaPo)
7. US Trade Representative Ron Kirk says he is "dumbfounded" and "shell-shocked" by Senate Republicans who are blocking action on free-trade agreements with South Korea, Colombia, and Panama (AP via WaPo)
• US Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) attaches amendment to Korus FTA legislation that would ban any organization that provides abortions from receiving Medicaid family planning funds (Huffington Post)
8. Japanese Finance Minister Yoshihiko Noda says Japan and South Korea will work as "partners" in G20 meetings and other international forums (WSJ)
• Kushibo's note: This is not today's gag headline, even though it sounds like it

The Big Ko-tuna

Oh, look. He's waving at us.

Someone off Cheju-do caught a huge frickin'-ass tuna.

From the Joongang Daily:

Chefs yesterday lift a giant bluefin tuna to divide into pieces at a tuna restaurant in Chonggak, central Seoul. The tuna, which weighed 350 kilograms (772 pounds) and measured 270 centimeters (8 feet 10 inches) long, was caught off the shores of Cheju Island.

Frankly, I wouldn't want to eat any of that thing. Something that big has been around for a long time and has probably consumed high amounts of stuff you don't want in your system. In fact, if they don't nickname him "The Big Ko-Tuna," I vote they call him Freddie Mercury.

Daily Kor for Friday, July 1, 2011

And the award for lamest headline of the week goes to the Wall Street Journal, for this one: "South Koreans Still Unbowed" (it's about archery's 2011 World Championships in Torino on Sunday).

And the non-story of the day is North Korea temporarily presiding over the UN's nuclear disarmament body (#4). It's for a term that's just a matter of weeks, determined by well-known system of rotation, but it's being used as a pretext for "getting the US out of the UN" (or getting the UN out of the US). In fact, the UN is an important organization that, though flawed, does a lot of crucial stuff (HT to hoju_saram for link).

If the problem is that a country like the DPRK which has violated UN regulations on nuclear disarmament should not be in charge of the UN organization whose regulations it thumbed its nose at, then go ahead and push for rules that prevent that type of occurrence. This is not the first time this type of thing has happened (I seem to recall Libya chairing a UN group dealing with human rights a few years aback), so let's go solve it. Baby. Bathwater. Throw out. Bad.

Meanwhile, the Joongang Daily is reporting on the AP bureau opening in Pyongyang, which I consider a major story even though it has gotten very little coverage elsewhere.

1. Republican boycott over jobs protection add-on forces US Senate Finance Committee to postpone action on free-trade agreements with South Korea, Colombia, and Panama (AP via WaPo, WaPo) 
2. Samsung Electronics files complaint with US International Trade Commission, asking the United States to prohibit Apple from importing into United States key products, including the latest iPhone and iPad devices amid an escalating patent dispute (AP via WaPo, WSJ)
3. National Assembly passes disputed judicial reform bill that would give more investigatory powers to police (Yonhap, Joongang Daily)
• President Lee asks prosecutors to "respond maturely" (Yonhap)
• Kushibo's note: ... Or else he'll turn this car around... He really will... Don't make him do it!
4. United Nations is criticized by Republicans in US for North Korea receiving a rotating chairmanship of nuclear disarmament body (Yonhap)
5. Consumer prices rise 4.4 percent in June from a year earlier (Yonhap)
6. Seoul appellate court reduces sentence of Reverend Han Sangryol, pastor who visited North Korea in violation of contentious National Security Law, from five years to three years (AP via WaPo)
• Kushibo's note: Find me one person in Korea who serves their full sentence for anything less than life imprisonment, and I owe you a Coke™
7. South Korea to freeze gasoline prices in July due to inflationary pressures (Bloomberg, Reuters)
8. South Korean striker Ji Dong-Won joins English Premier League club Sunderland (CNN)
9. Protesters against free-trade agreement entertain other demonstrators with new musical detailing their struggle against Lee administration policies, A Korus Line (Yonhap)