After teaching business in Seoul and Hong Kong for many years, retired Professor Ted Wallin mentors and encourages students at Syracuse University. There’s a catchy song about train safety that takes me back in time, back to Professor Ted Wallin’s marketing class at Sejong University in Seoul. Professor Wallin taught in the Sejong-Syracuse MBA program…
Adjusting to a new country can bring huge amounts of stress. But Adam Czelusta powered through and built a life here — and an art career too. Adam Czelusta and I first crossed paths around 2014, when we both did some work for Groove magazine’s 100th edition. I got to interview human rights champion Yiombi…
Every Wednesday, activists gather in Seoul to support the survivors of Japanese military sexual slavery. But counterprotesters gather nearby, calling the movement a fraud and denying the victims’ testimonies. A Japanese expat and longtime ally of the grandmothers explains what’s behind the denials. On Wednesday, May 5, protesters gathered outside the former site of the…
University English instructor Sonia Knapp thought her Korea adventure might last a year. That was more than two decades ago. When Sonia Knapp set out for Korea in 1998, it was supposed to be short term. A New Orleans native, she was teaching at a high school in Moab, Utah, and getting tired of it….
A Korean charity collaborated with Korean vets and US military personnel to neuter about 200 feral cats at the soon-to-be-former Yongsan Garrison in Seoul. What will happen when the base closes? (Continued from part 1.) Despite its increasing popularity as a humane, effective way of controlling feral cat populations, trap-neuter-release has its detractors. Cats get in…
In Korea and much of the world, trap-neuter-return programs are a widely accepted way of controlling feral populations and reducing conflicts between cats and humans. Why is the US military so slow to catch up? Kerri Burrows used to go hiking on Namsan every week. On one hike, she saw a poster about stray cats. She…
Yiombi Thona, a prominent Congolese refugee activist and human rights educator, talks about the “responsibility crisis” that prevents the world’s nations from meeting their obligations to asylum seekers. It was an honor to interview Yiombi Thona in 2014 for a special issue of Groove Korea to commemorate the magazine’s 100th edition. The theme was “100…