TED Review (The Power of Introverts)

KMLA is not a suitable place for introverts?

Every year, the freshmen students take MBTI test, which is one of the most common personality tests of the world. After the test result comes out, the school counselor announces the results in the counseling class. Guess how many people were I(introversion) in my class? Only two, including me. Strangely, the most common personality type of Koreans is ISTJ(introversion, sensing, thinking, and judgement), but the most common type among the 16^th wavers is ENFP, the opposite of ISTJ. Especially, in my class about the half of the students were ENFP. Is this phenomenon a mere accident? Or is there culture more favorable to extroverts?

I believe that this extroverted society was made mainly because of the entrance interviews. Although teachers must have tried to be objective and balanced, the extroverts tend to speak with more ease than the introverts. When an introvert says 8 out of 10, an extrovert says about 12. I myself felt an interview more burdensome than a paper based exam; taking a test, I would have been able to go through and check my responses over and over, but in interview, if I say something there is no way to fix it. If I had not practiced to deny my predilection not to talk a lot, I might not be here now in KMLA.

According to Susan Cain, in America many things are set for people who are extrovert and outgoing. Most schools in the U.S. encourage group works and speaking, but often are ignorant about the individual works. In KMLA, students do have individual works, as much as the group works, so we certainly ‘have opportunity’ to develop our introspections. Nevertheless, students are too busy to use those opportunity properly. Many freshmen and juniors use up their time doing club activities, practicing presentation in group, etc. Time, the essence of introspections, is in dearth in our school. Even the domestic students, though they generally more focus on the individual works, they tend to devote their energy wholly to keep high rankings and GPA. This attitude may be the best strategy for going to be admitted to a top university but is certainly not a favorable phenomenon in a "leadership academy." In fact, “the power of introvert” is realized when introvert people share their ideas with others.

If Korean Minjok Leadership Academy does aim to raise global servant leaders, students have learn how to use their abilities for others. Of course, being active and motivated is the primary step to be a leader. But I wish we all remember that becoming a leader does not mean simply outgoing or academically perfect.

UC Chicago Essay(Option 1)

Essay Option 1.

"A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies." –Oscar Wilde.
Othello and Iago. Dorothy and the Wicked Witch. Autobots and Decepticons. History and art are full of heroes and their enemies. Tell us about the relationship between you and your arch-nemesis (either real or imagined).
Inspired by Martin Krzywy, admitted student Class of 2016.


 

People fight against their enemies to defend themselves either physically or mentally. They fight over a power to control their fates. Writing this essay, I am warding off my arch-nemesis, landing silently on my shoulder and whenever I get to start something important. This invisible enemy is “Fear”, fear not to be successful.

It was last semester, in the middle of May. I was standing in front of four peers, and a teacher was sitting in the back of the office. Nothing was peculiar, even that I blundered my presentation. I was to hear a contrite comment that I had heard after every presentation: “I see your effort, but I could not hear you. You looked too embarrassed. Why don’t you have confidence with your work?” I had not answered the last question verbally, but had only thought to myself, “Confidence? I was always confident with my work, but the only problem is that no one catches that emotion.” Finally the teacher opened his mouth, however, with unexpected inquiry: “Why, do you think, do you give a presentation to us?” Why had I spoken in front of others? After all, I had always blamed my tone and the insensibility of the teachers and returned to individual works, which had generally had an acceptable quality, sometimes even been excellent. Why should I preconclude a public speech is an embarrassing moment that shall pass? Why not try to break this enduring pain?

While I was in this chain of thought, the class was finished. Fear was now banishing with the bell.

I wanted to be perfect. But whenever I try my best, I would hear Fear slicking through the window, tiptoeing toward me, and landing on my shoulder. Every motion of Fear would amplify and confuse me. It was all because of Fear. I really wanted to be perfect. At least I hoped for the best in the real presentation on the next day.

Not to be distracted from the presentation, I could expect two scenarios: I would concentrate on the presentation, ignoring Fear, or practice presentation until I could recite it automatically. A strong-willed human or a cold machine? What would I choose?

I decided to be a machine, unsatisfyingly. Hey, life is not a drama. No one can change one’s persona in a day. I wanted something real and certain. The days and nights I spent for the research and the presentation were real. They deserved rewards.

That night I repeated the presentation in front of the mirror in the bathroom, over and over. First, I read the script I wrote over and over. Then, I could recite the script without looking at it. Finally, I looked in the mirror, and checked my tone and posture. There, in the mirror, Fear was staring at me, hopping and running around. After several times, my tongue and my neck were moving by themselves. I was still greatly annoyed; nonetheless, it was impossible to stop my voice. In the mirror, there wasn’t me, but only Fear.

“You cannot defeat me from now on; because, there is no one to defeat.”

The lonely enemy trudged away. My effort was finally rewarded in the next morning. Yet, as soon as I came back to my room, I could clearly see the enemy hanging on my shoulder.

 

Essay with 996 characters!(Abandoning pets)

People may not abandon their pets. What is justice? Why can’t one kill or deceive others? Justice is to respect other people’s right. Yet, pets are not people. Pets are movable goods, belonged to legal owners. Since pets are physical properties, nothing can be wrong about abandoning one’s pet.

Many people feel guilty about deserting pets, but this sentiment is myopic. Imagine a family which can no longer raise a dog, for it moves to an apartment abandoning pets. It would be nice if the family gives the dog to someone else, but it may be impossible; most only want puppies. Then, leaving the dog on a street is the most effective and convenient way to find a new owner. If it is sent to an animal shelter or hospital right away, it must be killed if it is not adopted. But if it is left on a street, it can be either found by a kind, new owner or brought to an animal shelter after a few days. It might be killed by accident, yet it can be exposed to many people and live as long as possible.

Ben X review

Imagine a boy in front of flashing computer screen, clicking busily the mouse. Is he wasting his time alone or is he enjoying his free time, like typical teenagers? If a Korean is asked of this question, he or she must show negative impression of the boy. In fact, a computer game can be a useful tool to release someone’s stress outside a real world. However, we, Koreans are very eager to say that a computer game is lame and unproductive, in any cases. This prejudice might be the brocade that prevented me from understanding “Ben X” at the first time.

In Korea, most students experience excitement and joy of playing an online game. More and more games permeate to people lives through personal electronic devices. However, despite this general trend, people are acquainted with more gloomy and dark sides of online games. We often see the article that associate a criminal and addiction to violent games.

Ben is one who builds his haven in an imaginary world. We cannot judge whether his way of solving his problem is good or bad, yet it seems realistic. Although the adults around him try to understand him, the adults fail to encourage him to speak up. They overlook his difference, saying that Ben is academically okay, and even excellent. Later on as Ben gets trapped in more and more problems, they preclude that the exotic boy is extremely self-centered and not willing to communicate with others. In fact, Ben needs others’ help to escape from abysmal isolation. “He is way too slower than everyone else.”

 

In contrary, when Ben enters in the online, he becomes capable of controlling his appearance and pace. He can log in and out whenever he wants to. He is a muscular hero with level 80. Most importantly, there is a girl who waits for him and listens to him.

According to IMDb, Ben X is often pronounced “Bennicks”, which means “I am nothing” in Dutch. Ben pacifies himself when he logs in as Ben X, but he had to mend the discrepancy between his identity in the real world and in the cyber world in order to find his true identity. Moreover, as the movie goes on the watertight boundary between the two distant worlds starts to break away: the girl in the game tries to meet Ben in offline, and the bullies upload the video of Ben being taken off his pants. Ben compromises the two identities harmoniously, if not idealistically. He merges the image of his only supporter to the real world. With a help of his girlfriend, though she is only a false image, he is empowered to keep on living and share his feelings with others.

Realizing that Scarlite was not a real person, a movie “Beautiful Mind” came to my mind. “Beautiful mind” also deals with hallucinations, but in contrast with Ben X, the protagonist strives to escape from the hallucination. At last, he chooses to live along with the false image not to depend on medication. Though his psychological disease is incurable, he eventually finds his way not to be perturbed by the handicap. I think “Ben X” gives us similar solution for autism. Not every problem can be solved perfectly. In such cases, we have to find a way to live along with it.

 

Flash Fictions

1. English assignment
I opened up my notebook and typed "f" automatically.
2012. 11. 21.
What am I supposed to write about?

Essay Due Date 2012. 11. 20

2. Absent from morning excercise
Fresh Monday morning! I felt wonderful and everything was fine. Except for the alarm clock.

3. Snow
The more, the better.

4. 2012. 12. 21.
No asteroid appeared. Everyone cheered. Then the electricity was cut off.

5. Computer Violation
I'm the king of the universe. Knock, knock... Oh, hi, Daeki Kim.

6.
0:00
I have six hours left for the physics assignment, essay, and wordsmart quiz. Fine. Two hours each.
2:00
Maybe I'll drop the quiz. I opened the notebook, and realized that I didn't charge it. Maybe I'll skip the morning excercise.
6:00
Only two problems were solved.

7. KMLA
Bring in a hope, run out of it, and make another hope and bring it to the next stage.

8.
You only realize that you were sleeping when you wake up.

9. Mycrocosm in my mug
"Making something out of nothing."
Say hello to my cute, little friends.

10.
Andy crawled to freedom through five hundred yards of shit-smelling foulness. The next day, Dany crawled through the same pipe; he found himself behind the Rita Hayworth.

Ben X Review

Ben X: A Realistic Approach to Autism

Autism is not at all a new topic to us. I’ve watched several didactic movies about how we get along with a friend with autism in school. In those movies, attentive adults admonish bullying students saying that “autism is not wrong but special.” Watching those movies, children learn that people with autism or with any other disorder are the same human beings. However, Ben X conveys more than an obvious message. Contrary to the adults in the general movies about autism, Ben’s parents and teachers are rather indifferent to Ben, assuming that he is not different from ordinary boys. Even when Ben is bullied in front of the class, no adult finds out what exactly has happened to him. Autistic people are actually different from non-autistic people; if not, they would not have been diagnosed as autism. Of course, an autistic child should be instructed to become independent, as other children are, but it does not mean that he can be independent with the same amount of care and attention others receive. A naive hope that her son is fine and normal must be hindering Ben’s mother from facing this reality. I wish she had tried harder to communicate more with her son when he was younger. He seems to have escaped from abysmal isolation in reality and established his haven in the cyber world long time ago. Albert Einstein once said, “The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.” It must be ignorance not bullying that isolates Ben from his family and school.

Earthlings Review 2nd draft(with hyperlinks)

‘Earthlings,’ One Step Toward the Planetary Humanity

 

As a member of a famous animal rights movement group in Korea, I myself have been interested in animal rights and animal protection for many years. Whenever I read the articles or postings about the cruelties to animals, I see a great number of people are interested in the issue just like me. Yet, we are hardly at consensus about what are animal rights and how we should protect them. Some of us are as extreme as to avoid meats and any products that are made from animals; some others are purely motivated to participate in animal protection by affection to animals, mostly pets. The director of Earthlings, Shaun Monson, is close to the former group. He alleges that animals, not only humans, have rights to live an unperturbed life, criticizing commercial exploits of animals. This extreme stance of the director contributes to polarized reactions to Earthlings; many vegans and animal activists agree with his position, while others are uncomfortable and critical about it. Whether or not the director’s point can be admitted to the public, the movie aptly conveys its message to viewers and brings out wanted reactions from them.

Some people argue that the issues of the movie are so widely ranged that it fails to suggest any detailed and feasible solution for any matter. However, if we look closer, we can see the common center of the myriads of brief information; the origin of the problem is originated not in a particular field of industry or by a particular group of people, but in a universal attitude of people toward other species. It does matter that we are eating meat of chickens and pigs raised in filthy and overcrowded factories and our clothes contain deadly preserves. It is possible to temporarily alleviate the life conditions of animals in certain industries, enforcing new laws and policies; however, unless people think it is wrong to treat animals as the resources for products, another problem will continue to emerge from any other place. For instance, despite the restraints in many regions of India, people have designed a “death march” which is to transport cows for days to a region where killing cow is legal, till they die from starvation and torture. In fact, to the Hindus, the leather industry in India is a hideous blasphemy. Yet, the industry has grown to be the biggest in the world due to the endless and increasing consumptions of leathers in Western countries. As far as the consumption and need for the leather exists, manufacturers will do anything to fulfill the needs. The last scene of the clothing exemplifies the director’s main point with ironic metaphor; a woman asks “how much does this run” and the clerk responds, “This is… $49,500.” Can human beings measure the cost of death of other living creature in dollars? Yet, most people view animals as natural resources that can be freely exploited by us, the most intelligent creatures. After seeing the wide ranging problems, we are forced to conclude that attempt to commercialize animals is the fundamental reason of the problem.

Some people also assert that the film is emotionally effective but fails to change people’s behavior. First of all, I want to point out that pathos is not at all an inferior method to persuade people to logos. In fact, animal protection is all about emotions, especially compassion. In an interview, Shaun Monson says when we view any group with empathy, it mirrors our humanity. Since long before the ancient civilization evolved, people divided people into two groups; the neighbors linked with compassion and sympathy and outsiders viewed with apathy and hostility. People start to care about others when they feel empathy. Without empathy the world would be full of wars, disputes, and violence. The director goes one step farther to extend this humane sentiment to the all living creatures sharing common emotions and senses. Tolstoy said, "as long as there are slaughterhouses, there will be battlefields.” This quote implies that as far as apathy toward certain groups exists, it reflects our humanity. In a sense, overcoming speciesism is relevant to maintaining harmony in human society. If the director had relied on logic and reason to persuade we should not treat animals as mere objects or lesser creatures, it would have been impossible to move so many people’s minds and reinforce the link among the earthlings.

It is true that even with deep resonance, few people actually change their life style after watching this film. Many people say in response videos, that they felt great guilt while watching the film, yet are still ignorant about speciesism after the movie ended. People tend to justify their meat oriented eating habits, animal experiments and animal products, clinging to the belief that the conditions cannot be too bad as the film shows. The narrator says in the conclusion, that ignorance is the speciesist’s first line of defense. However, it is too early to conclude the film is a failure. The director believes that ignorance can be breached by anyone with time and determination to find out the truth. We must go through ridicule and violent opposition to reach general acceptance. Since, exploits of animals are so deeply rooted a custom in human history, it requires pains and struggles to disclaim this life style. However, as more and more people watch how their products and foods are made, they would inevitably search for a way to solve the problem.

Actually, I once tried to be a vegetarian months ago, after I watched a video of thousands of hogs buried alive when the foot andmouth disease prevailed. During the first week after watching, I avoided eating any food containing meats or eggs due to trauma. Yet, the trauma faded away after a week and now I eat meats and dairy foods, though less frequently and in less amount. Change usually comes when the small stimulants amass to the tipping point. This 90 minute movie is hardly a life shifting experience for many people. Nonetheless, this film fulfills its role to make people take a first step toward thinking about the animal rights, and investigate and discuss about what the “truth” is.

Earthlings Review(First Draft)

One Step into the Truth

As a member of a famous animal right movement group in Korea, I myself have been interested in animal rights and animal protection for many years. Whenever I read the articles or postings about the cruelties to animals on the Internet, I see a great number of people are interested in the issue just like me. Yet, we are hardly at consensus about what is the animal right and how we should protect the animals. Some of us are as extreme as to avoid meats and any products that are made from animals, and some are purely motivated to participate in animal protection by inclination toward other animals, mostly pets. The director of Earthlings, Shaun Monson, is close to the former. He alleges that the animals, not only the humans, have rights to live unperturbed life, criticizing commercial exploits of animals. This extreme stance of the director contributes to polarized reactions to Earthlings; many vegans and animal activists welcome his points, while others are uncomfortable and critical about them. However, whether or not the director’s point can be admitted, the movie is well made to convey its message and bring out wanted reactions from the audience.

Some people argue that the issues of the movie are so wide-ranged that it failed to suggest any detailed and feasible solution for any matter. However, if we look closer, we can see the common center of the myriads of information; the origin of the problem is not in a particular field of industry or particular class of people, but in universal attitude of people toward the other species. It does matter that we are eating the chickens and pigs raised in filthy and overcrowded place and our clothes contain deadly preserves; however, unless people think it is wrong to treat animals as the resources for products, another problem will continue to emerge from any other place, even when we try to alleviate in one problem. For instance, despite of the restraints in many regions of India, people have designed devastating “death march” to transport the region where killing cow is legal. As far as the consumption and need for the leather exists, manufacturers will do anything to fulfill the needs. The last scene of the clothing exemplifies the director’s main point with ironic metaphor; a woman asks “how much is this run” and a clerk responds, “This is… $49,500.” Can human beings measure the devastating suffering and violences of the death march in monetary values? After seeing the wide ranging problems of cruelties to animals, we are forced to conclude that an attempt to commercialize animals has to be changed.

Some people also assert that the film is emotionally effective but fails to change people’s behavior. First of all, I want to point out that persuasion by pathos is not at all inferior to that by logos. Moreover, animal protection is all about emotions, especially compassion. In an interview, Shaun Monson says in an interview that if we view any group in the perspective of empathy, it would mirror our humanity. Since long before the civilization evolved, people divided people into two groups: the inner group linked with compassion and sympathy, and outer group avoided with apathy and hostility. People start to care about others when they feel empathy. Without empathy the world would be full of wars, disputes, and jealousy. The director goes one step farther to extend this universal sentiment to the all creatures. As Tolstoy said, "as long as there are slaughterhouses, there will be battlefields,” as well as apathy exists toward certain group, it would reflect our humanity. Like the elephant trainer in the film, people with extreme hostility to other creatures are very likely to have the similar problem with relationships with other people, since animals are emotional beings like humans. Earthlings effectively triggers universal empathy to all living creatures using various video clips and quotes. If it had relied on logics and reasons why we should not treat animals as mere objects or lesser creatures, it would have been impossible to convince people of the link among the earthlings.

It is true that even with deep emotional resonance, few people actually change their life style after watching this film. Many people say in response videos, that they felt great guilt while watching the film, yet are still ignorant about speciesism. People tend to justify their meat-eating, animal experiments and animal products, clinging to the belief that the conditions cannot be too bad. As the narrator says in the conclusion, ignorance is the speciesist’s first line of defense. However, the director believes that ignorance can be breached by anyone with time and determination to find out the truth. To pursue the change, we must go through ridicule and violent opposition, the first two steps of three stages of truth. Since, exploits of animals are so deeply rooted a custom in human history, it requires pains and struggles to disclaim this life style. However, as more and more people watch how their products and foods are made, they would inevitably find a way to ameliorate the conditions of animals.

Actually, I once tried to be a vegetarian a few months ago, after I watched a video of thousands of hogs being buried alive last year when the foot and mouth disease was spreading. During the first week after I watched the video, I avoided eating any food containing meats or eggs because of trauma. Yet, the trauma fainted away day by day, and now I eat meats and dairy foods, though less frequently and in less amount. Change, usually comes when the stimulants accumulate to a tip point. This 90 minutes movie on Youtube can hardly be life shifting experience for many people. Nonetheless, this film introduce people to take a first step into the animal rights and make them investigate, research, and discuss to find what is the “truth”.

Naver Cast about Ray Bradbury's Fix-up Novels

http://navercast.naver.com/contents.nhn?contents_id=7341
--> This page introduces some fix-up novels written by Ray Bradbury including The Martian Chronicles. It also has a summary for each novel.(A little bit of spoilers..)

Fix-up novels are the short stories composed of initially unrelated stories. Each chapter of the Martian Chronicles was a separate piece of work, as well. I guess the short chapters, like The Rocket Summer and The Taxpayer, were written afterward to make the whole story flow smoothly.

Reading Journal#1 (with Quote)

The Earth Man

 

"I don't suppose you could even-" suggested the captain. "I mean, that is, try to, or think about..." He hesitated. "We've worked hard, we've come a long way, and maybe you could just shake our hands and say 'Well done!" do you-think?" His voice faded.

Reading this paragraph, I caught the message the author wants to convey in a story about martians: different people can view on the same incidence from incredibly different perspectives. In this chapter, Captain William landed on Mars with his crews as the Second Expedition. When he first lands on the alien planet, he expected warm, amazed welcome from the Martian. Yet, to disappointment, the Martian are not at all surprised or interested in the 'aliens'.

One of the most interesting, and also the most weird thing, in this novel is the reactions of the martian people to the alien explorers. Isn't it amazing to meet a man from Earth? Are they too busy to realize that talking with an alien is, indeed, an abnormal experience?

 

 

It is only 'our expectation' that the martians should be stunned to meet an alien or, more basically, should realize that they are experiencing something exotic. To be stunned, one should find something to be stunned; if he can't, he would feel normal and natural. Since the Martian are very used to psychic activities, such as telepathy and false image, they are more likely to mark the earth men with insanity than to accept what they see, hear, and smell. It is only after Mr. Xxx shots all the innocent explorers off, that he recognize that he has been confronted with something more extraneous than mere imagery. I guess the reason why the fabricated village appears in The Third Expedition is that the Martian understand the existence of extraterrestrial beings on the third planet in the solar system.

When I was reading through the first few chapters, I could not understand why so many readers applauded this childish, cheesy, and simple novel. However, now I realize that this novel appeals with hidden creepiness and fresh and distanced perspective toward the civilization on Earth.

Assignment#1 Childhood Trauma(REVISION)

Locked "Out" of the House

You are an eight-year-old girl, who love your family. You have a five-year-old younger brother, who looks naïve and cherubim like a typical five-year-old child. You and your brother, living next to grandma’s house, visit Grandma almost once a week. Grandma’s house, which is an apartment just like your house, is small but decorative.

The house has two verandas; one directed outward to the road is full of trees and flowers, all groomed by Grandma, and the other, smaller one, facing the playground has an antique and cozy armchair. Sitting on the armchair, you see and hear the children running around and giggling brightly from the playground. What a peaceful afternoon; you sit here enjoying warm, suave breeze until Grandma calls you for dinner. Your eye leads slowly come down. Then, you glance at an object behind the window. It is your brother, with his blank, naïve countenance. 'Why is he standing there alone?’ He lifts up the lever, turns away and waddles out of the room. You push the window aside but it does not move; yes, you are locked in the veranda by your five-year-old brother.

You hesitatingly perch yourself on the chair, with the blank face and empty brain. 'What just happened?' Yet, it takes only a few seconds for you to realize that you cannot escape from this tiny veranda before someone appears to save you. “Grandma! Grandma, where are you?” You call for grandma’s help, first murmuring then raising your tremoring voice. Yet, your feeble voice can never penetrate the tightly closed window. Furthermore, your grandma's bad ears would have no way to catch your voice. Now you are desperate: you might even starve to death in this veranda. You keep imagining: ‘People will find me mummified and laugh at how stupidly I died.’ Now presumably the last day in this world does not seem so peaceful and warm; you see the playful children out there, yet you are not able to join them any more. You even imagine to jump off the eleventh floor and land on the floor gently, like a cat or superhero. But, of course, you're neither a cat nor a hero.

After an hour, which felt like a day, you see your grandma holding your brother’s hand come into the room. You quickly approach the window and knock furiously. She opens the window, astonished. You no longer have to worry about being a mummy. Your brother, watching you exhausted, has cunningly innocent look as if he's saying, “I have no idea what just happened to you”. You shout, “Grandma, he locked the window an hour ago!”

She, still holding his hand and grinning, transmits your words to him softly “Sweetie, did you lock the window?” “Well, I didn’t know I was locking it,” he simply replies. How can you argue more? Your grandma thinks he capable of nothing but eating and throwing temper tantrums. You can only forgive your young brother, but still having doubt if he really did not know what he was doing. Why was he behind the window, doing something, that he has no idea what it is? Nobody knows.

You learn two lessons from this “near to death” experience: First, your younger brother can be dangerous in some unexpected way; second, you should always be cautious when you are in a closed place. Ironically, you escaped from the veranda but not from more traumatic experiences of locking in later on: You were to locked in a bathroom of a ferry, and then in a secluded classroom of your middleschool.