New World Bank chief is committed to the poor
Business Day (South Africa)

Jim Yong Kim, born in South Korea, has spent his career in healthcare in developing countries. His commitment to the poor cannot be doubted.

South Korean activists detained in China: Seoul
AFP via Yahoo News

Four South Korean activists have been detained in China since March on suspicion of spying after they interviewed North Korean refugees living in hiding there, according to an anti-Pyongyang group.

South Korea’s foreign ministry confirmed the four were arrested in the northeastern Chinese city of Dalian on March 29 on charges of “endangering state security.”

Myanmar Vows to Cease Buying Weapons From North Korea
New York Times

South Korea has received assurances from Myanmar that it will no longer buy weapons from North Korea, an aide to President Lee Myung-bak said Tuesday.

N. Korea stops sending out GPS jamming signals against S. Korea: source
Yonhap News

North Korea appears to have stopped jamming satellite signals in an apparent attempt to disrupt air and maritime traffic navigation systems in parts of South Korea, a high-ranking government source in Seoul said Tuesday.

The North has been blamed for global positioning system (GPS) disruptions that affected hundreds of commercial flights and ships in and out of South Korea since April 28, although no damage was caused as all had backup navigational systems.

In China, English teaching is a whites-only club
MSNBC.com

Speak a little English and are willing to relocate? Well, you’re probably qualified to be an English-language instructor in China.

As long as you are white, that is.

New Claim in Gambling Monks Scandal
Wall Street Journal

An exiled monk who dropped a bombshell by releasing a video of eight senior monks smoking and drinking while playing poker in a hotel room detonated another explosive on Tuesday.

Seong-ho, whose real name is Jeong Han-young, told a morning radio show that two leaders at the Jogye Order of Korean Buddhism, including the head monk, went to a “room salon,” or late-night drinking bar in southern Seoul, where he claimed the monks paid for sex.

Poirier expects to dismantle ‘Korean Zombie’ Jung
USA Today

Dustin Poirier believes he can draw out the Chan Sung Jung that slugged his way to a “Korean Zombie” nickname.

“He likes to get in there and throw punches, so I think if he gets hit on the chin, it’s going to go back to a brawl,” says Poirier, who will face Jung on Tuesday for the Ultimate Fighting Championship. “I’m expecting to pick him apart.”

Shin-Soo Choo is Tribe’s newest leadoff hitter
Cleveland Plain Dealer

Acta put Choo in the leadoff spot that time to get him some extra at bats. This time around, Acta is more interested in Choo’s .361 on base percentage.

“We need somebody to get on base,” said Acta. “Choo has a good on base percentage. The league average is .319.”

Jessica Jung First Pitch Fail: Korean Singer Makes Terrible Throw (VIDEO)
Huffington Post

Thanks to 23-year-old Jessica Jung, baseball fans everywhere now have a new video instructing the proper mechanics of how not to throw a baseball.

Jung is a Korean-American singer and dancer best known for her work in the nine-girl group, Girls’ Generation. Escorted to the mound by two mascots of the Seoul-based LG Twins, Jung prepares her pitch with a long wind-up before unleashing her best heat.

Udine 2012 Review: UNBOWED
Twitch Film

Following its release earlier this year during the lunar day holiday, Unbowed met with much the same reaction as last year’s Silenced. They were both incendiary courtroom dramas based on real events that became big commercial and critical hits while also serving to open up long overdue national dialogues about Korea’s justice system and its rampant cronyism. In fact, in the space of just a few months there were three high profile Korean courtroom dramas that connected with audiences, the other being The Client (2011), itself a strong feature which also alluded to problems in the country’s legal system but was mostly a generic (and fictional) piece.

CIA agent on using his wife to smuggle equipment … and how ALL North Koreans are obsessed with porn
The Daily Mail (U.K.)

He learned about blood feuds from Afghan tribal leaders and he learned that al Qaeda terrorists and enemy agents from North Korea all have a weakness for porn.

Crumpton said: ‘I never met a North Korean that did not like pornography.’

Telling interviewer Lara Logan what he would have to do in his line of work, Crumpton said: ‘Supplying porn to a North Korean official to entice them to spy for America, along with money or whatever else it might take. Well, for me the answer was yes, I was willing to do that.’

A Cautious Celebration for Kim
Huffington Post

So let’s not damn the new World Bank president Jim Yong Kim by association with the illegitimate, anachronistic process that put him there. Let’s not linger, right now, on the lack of a fair vote between countries for leadership of either the Bank or the IMF. Let’s not ask again, at least until tomorrow, how the bilateral donors of Europe and US can square their lock on these roles with their increasing emphasis on transparency and accountability.

Let’s celebrate, and look forward.

Hospital to live tweet brain surgery, put pics on Pinterest
CNN.com

The operation is called a brain tumor resection. It’s designed to remove a tumor to prevent seizures. It will be performed by Dr. Dong Kim, a neurosurgeon who helped lead the team that treated former congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords after she was shot in the head in 2011.

12-Year-Old Gets Perfect Score on Math SAT
Patch.com (Buffalo Grove, Ill.)

Sixth-grader Joshua Yoon of Buffalo Grove scored an 800 on the same college assessment test taken by high school students this year.

Korean cuisine emerging as an influential global food trend: food consultants
New York Daily News

It was predicted to become one of the food trends of 2012. And if an appearance on the menus of family-style international eateries and celebrity-backed restaurant openings are anything to go by, all indications are that Korean cuisine is poised to become as ubiquitous around the world as Thai and Vietnamese fare.

North Korea Says Oh’s Wife is Dead
Wall Street Journal

The saga of Oh Kil-nam’s misguided venture into North Korea in the 1980s and the destruction it brought to his family took another sad twist Tuesday as word came from Pyongyang that his wife had died.

Backed by activist groups and a loud advertising campaign, Mr. Oh last year challenged North Korea to free his wife and two daughters, who had been kept there for more than 20 years.

South Korean Nuclear Inspector Dies in Iran Crash
New York Times

A South Korean nuclear inspector on a mission for the United Nations was killed, and a Slovakian inspector was injured, when their car overturned on Tuesday near a nuclear site southwest of Tehran, semiofficial Iranian media reported.

‘Hawaii Five-0′: Daniel Dae Kim on McGarrett’s return, epic season finale
EW.com

Daniel Dae Kim is well versed in secret keeping. It was, he jokes (or not?), a “job requirement” on Lost. But if there’s one thing he’s not coy about, it’s his praise for the Hawaii Five-0 writing team, who dealt with unforeseen circumstances brought on by co-star Alex O’Loughlin’s sudden absence to seek prescription drug treatment.

Theatre World names winners
Variety

Hettienne Park will be awarded a Theatre World award for outstanding Broadway or off-Broadway debut. Park will be awarded for her Broadway debut for “Seminar,” starring Alan Rickman and later Jeff Goldblum, as well as her off-Broadway debut for “The Intelligent Homosexual’s Guide to Capitalism & Socialism with a Key to the Scriptures.”

Obama praises Kim, calls World Bank process transparent
Reuters via Chicago Tribune

U.S. President Barack Obama on Monday welcomed the selection of Jim Yong Kim as president of the World Bank, saying the selection process had been “open and transparent” and praising the man he proposed for the post for being an inclusive leader.

Q&A: New President Jim Kim on World Bank Priorities
The Wall Street Journal

Jim Yong Kim, who was elected Monday as the World Bank’s next president, will be the institution’s first leader with expertise in development rather than politics or finance. In a brief phone interview from Lima, Peru, where he was concluding his “global listening tour,” he said his “top priority” at the bank would be laying the groundwork for job creation. He also said he was confident he’d have “a very strong consensus” at the bank after emerging from the first contested race in the bank’s seven-decade history.

Korean Xenophobia Betrays Double Standards
The Chosun Ilbo

U.S. President Barack Obama has nominated Korean-American Jim Yong Kim, the president of Dartmouth College, as the next head of the World Bank. Obama’s selection of Kim drew praise both in the U.S. and here in Korea.

Kim moved to the U.S. with his parents when he was five and is an American citizen, but Koreans like to think of him as one of their own. Americans also congratulated Kim, who became the first Asian-American president of an Ivy League university and nominee for the next head of the World Bank. Critics voiced concerns whether Kim, a medical doctor by training, would be able to handle the developmental assistance the World Bank is known for, but nobody had any problem with his ethnic background.

Yet the exact opposite is happening here in Korea right now. The Philippine-born naturalized Korean citizen Jasmine Lee, who became a Saenuri Party lawmaker, has been the victim of malicious attacks on the Internet since the April 11 general election. People have been posting malicious comments about her on Twitter and other social networks, somehow linking her to the grisly murder of a young woman recently killed by an ethnic Korean from China.

North Korea threatens retaliation for scrapping of food aid
Los Angeles Times

North Korea on Tuesday answered world condemnation of its recent rocket test with defiance, threatening “retaliatory measures” if the United States fails to deliver food aid it canceled after the failed launch.

The Real Reason Why Asian Americans Are Outmarrying Less
The Wall Street Journal

When I was young, I remember my mom telling me once that she really had only four big hopes for me. “You do these four things and I will be happy,” she said. “One, practice piano. Two, go to a good college. Three, become a doctor. And four, marry a nice Taiwanese girl.”

Thirty years later, and I’m two for four. I reminded her of this other day: “Remember that list you had for me back when? Well, I’m batting .500. In baseball, that makes me a superstar.”

“Well, in testing, 50% means you fail,” she retorted. I love my mother.

Anyway, the conversation came up because we’d independently emailed each other an article recently published in the New York Times “Style” section, detailing the latest hot trend to hit the Times breakroom: Apparently, more and more Asian Americans are defying convention by…marrying Asian Americans.

Choi to the world
New York Post

Notes from the fifth annual Pebble Beach Food & Wine festival:

LA chef Roy Choi served his Sunny Spot pig’s feet at Friday night’s afterparty and cooked at a Food & Wine magazine Best New Chefs alumni dinner on Saturday alongside LA pal Ricardo Zarate of Picca. But he could have been even busier on Twitter. Choi (@RidingShotgunLA) posted photos with chefs including Jacques Pepin, Michelle Bernstein (“My Miami Boo”), Masaharu Morimoto, Paul Bartolotta, Michael White and Charles Phan of San Francisco’s Slanted Door and also tried to respond to as many people who wrote him on Twitter as possible.

Hooked on science by accident, Kimberly Choi puts it to work in the global community
Humanosphere

Kimberly Choi wound up testing malaria vaccines on mice quite by accident.

“I thought I was going to study Spanish literature,” Choi recalled.

But in 2006, Choi was encouraged by a high school biology teacher to participate in Seattle BioMed’s outreach program, BioQuest, which gives students a chance to do hands-on research.

“I thought that scientists were one way, and I was another,” she said. Instead, she wound up liking the work and built her education around that passion.

Now Choi works at Seattle BioMed, an organization focused on testing and developing vaccines to fight infectious diseases.

A Decorated Comedian
Central Jersey

TAKE a close look at Margaret Cho’s body — really, she doesn’t mind — and you’ll see flowers, birds and a beautiful collection of art. In fact, her entire back is decorated with tattoos and the comedian estimates that nearly 25 percent of her body is adorned with tattoo art.

Of course, Ms. Cho is better known for getting laughs than for getting ink, and for more than 20 years has been a staple on the stand-up circuit, peppering in appearances on television, as a contestant on Dancing With the Stars and performing on Broadway.

American Idol contestant Heejun Han sits down for an interview with allkpop!
allkpop

Korean American Heejun Han recently returned to his humble hometown of Queens, NY after a trip to Hollywood and breaking through to the Top 9 on ‘American Idol.’

Musical Viagra: how a young Korean pianist made me fall in love with Beethoven all over again
The Telegraph (U.K.)

HJ Lim has an awful lot going for her. Before even listening to her play there’s that name – part Bond girl, part assassin. There are her looks (remember when Martha Argerich and Ivo Pogorelich first hit the scene?). She’s one of the few pianists around that you could envisage hanging out with in Soho for a few hours on a Saturday night and having a total blast. And then I heard her play. Nothing prepared me for it – there’s an (often unspoken) criticism that the majority of Asian/Korean pianists are all technique and no musicality, pianistic robots. And this album rips that stereotype to shreds. The tendency to play it safe, that ‘once committed to disc it will be around forever so don’t push the boundaries’ mentality is blissfully absent. Everything is dangerously invigorating, strikingly original.

‘Space Bibimbap’ to Be Served on Regular Flights
The Chosun Ilbo

Korean cuisine originally developed for consumption by astronauts in space is likely to be served in the form of in-flight meals on regular, earth-bound flights.

The Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute said on Monday that it signed a deal with the association of Jeonju bibimbap producers to transfer its techniques for making bibimbap adapted to suit conditions in outer space. The association is planning to supply the ready-to-make and portable space food to domestic budget carriers.

David Chang Trumps Questlove In Battle For Fried Chicken Glory On ‘Fallon’
Huffington Post

The fried chicken rivalry between chef David Chang and Questlove of The Roots has been simmering for sometime now after a Twitter back-and-forth between the two gentlemen. Finally, they took their 140-character smack talking to the arena, by agreeing to have a fried chicken battle on April 12 on “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.”

[Kim Seong-kon] The value of minority voices in a homogeneous society
The Korea Herald

It may be a bit exaggerated to say we now live in the age of minorities and minority cultures. Nevertheless, it is undeniably true that ethnic minorities and their cultures are being recognized and appreciated in many countries these days. In the United States, for example, Americans elected Barack Obama as their president, giving tremendous hope to African Americans. President Obama also appointed ethnic minorities, including Korean Americans, to key posts in his Cabinet.

Back at scene of debacle, Na embraces notoriety
My San Antonio

Kevin Na and his caddie returned to the par-4 ninth hole at AT&T Oaks Course on Monday, and there were again some anxious moments.
This time, however, it did not involve an 8-iron. For the first time in his life, Na, 28, was wielding a chain saw. The PGA Tour veteran, a year after hacking around the woods adjacent to the fairway en route to a record-setting 12-over 16, took a measure of revenge as caddie Kenny Harms and manager Kevin Lynch looked on with pained expressions.

In Los Angeles, An Immigrant’s Dream Becomes A Jazz Hub
NPR

In the middle of recording his debut album, jazz vocalist Joon Lee received a phone call out of nowhere that made him stop, quite literally, in his tracks. A dark, run-down karaoke bar in the corner of a Little Tokyo strip mall was on the market — would he like to have a look?

It was the fall of 2009, and Lee was still a relative unknown in the Los Angeles jazz community. A Korean immigrant, he had been studying architecture in New York City when he heard a recording of pianist Chick Corea and vocalist Bobby McFerrin. He promptly quit school and moved across the country to study jazz singing.

World Bank Officially Selects Kim as President
New York Times

The World Bank on Monday named Jim Yong Kim, a global health expert and the president of Dartmouth College, as its next president in a widely expected appointment that continues the longstanding tradition of an American leading the Washington-based development institution.

Like Grandfather, Like Grandson: Kim Jong Un Plays to North Korea’s Generals
Time.com

On April 15, the 100th anniversary of the his grandfather’s birth, beefy 29-year old Kim Jong Un stepped up to the microphone and for the first time, the citizenry of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) as well as a world of curious onlookers, could actually hear what the young man sounded like. — The spitting image of his forefather’s propaganda portraits, “Lil’ Kim” — as he has been called by the foreign press — spoke clearly and with confidence for 20 minutes with the military’s general staff at his side and thousands of troops at attention in front of him in central Pyongyang’s Kim Il Sung square, named after the founding dynast and “Great Leader.”

Reporters Visiting Pyongyang Get Rare Chance to Meet North Koreans
Voice of America

Celebrations in Pyongyang marking the 100th birth anniversary of North Korea’s first leader, Kim Il Sung, gave a few foreign journalists a rare chance to visit the reclusive and impoverished nation, and to talk with some of its people. VOA’s Sungwon Baik was one of them and has this report from the North Korean capital.

Security Council Expands Sanctions on North Korea
New York Times

The United Nations Security Council officially censured North Korea on Monday over the failed rocket launching of a satellite last week, saying it “strongly condemns” the action and had ordered its sanctions committee to expand the blacklist of North Korean goods, companies, and individuals connected to that country’s nuclear and missile programs.

Jasmine Lee Faces Racial Abuse After Election Win
Chosun Ilbo

A Philippine-born naturalized Korean who became a ruling Saenuri Party lawmaker has become the target of racist-tinged attacks on the Internet.

Steven Yeun and Lauren Cohan Talk ‘Walking Dead’ Season 3
Screen Rant

Yeun and Cohan were greeted enthusiastically by the crowd at the event, prompting both to talk about how the show’s success has changed their lives; when they walk down the street now, they’re recognized as Glenn and Maggie. For Yeun, it even meant meeting a fan in Korea who waited for an entire day at a coffee shop near his hotel because he had gone there once earlier. Said Yeun: “I felt bad that she’d waited for me, so I bought her a hot chocolate.”

Actor reflects on Asian-American heritage
Yale Daily News

Actor John Cho — famous for his role as Harold Lee in the “Harold and Kumar” films — discussed the intersection of acting and Asian-American identity Saturday evening.

Cho, who has also appeared in “Star Trek” and “American Pie,” said he has always practiced a policy of “not doing stereotypical parts” that typecast Asian-Americans. He told anecdotes from his childhood and talked about his Korean heritage in front of more than 200 students in the Berkeley College dining hall as part of the Asian American Cultural Center’s annual celebration of Asian Pacific-American Heritage Month.

Lessons for my 5 year old, the tragedies at Oikos and Virginia Tech
San Francisco Chronicle

Tomorrow my daughter turns five years old. And having endured the San Francisco Unified School District “lottery” she will begin kindergarten in the fall. So I have been thinking a lot about how to prepare her for the classroom environment and, in a way, life. The tragedy last week at Oikos University, though, brought to mind another five-year anniversary, the massacre at Virginia Tech.

The day before my daughter was born, a Korean American student, Seung-Hui Cho, shot and killed thirty-two people and wounded another twenty-five, one of the worst massacres on a college campus in US history. But on April 16, 2007, I had other things on my mind. My wife was in active labor and I was devoted to the futile effort to keep her comfortable. I rushed her the hospital and in the wee hours of the next morning we had a medically uneventful delivery. I was overwhelmed with relief. As a pediatrician I have seen too many bad delivery outcomes to take for granted a pink screaming baby and a happily recovering mother.

New guidebook helps boro Koreans find help
TimesLedger (Queens, N.Y.)

Korean-speaking immigrants will have an easier time understanding what services they are entitled to after a new guide was jointly released by the city and a nonprofit group.

State Assemblywoman Grace Meng (D-Flushing) lauded the newest translation of the Immigrant Rights and Services Manual at a news conference Monday.

“This is exactly what government should be doing — improving access to vital services and increasing engagement and participation,” she said in a statement.

Q&A with Director Joseph Kahn
Seattle Post-Intelligencer

I sat down with Director Joseph Kahn to talk about his new film Detention. One of the most successful music video directors or our time has released an independent film written, directed, and funded by himself. We discuss his past shooting music videos, our new generation of kids, and the difficult transition from music to feature films.

I was doing research before this interview and saw you’ve directed a lot of music videos I really like. I was surprised with how many early 90’s hip hop videos you did.

Joseph Kahn: I started doing Gangster Rap videos. [laughs]. If you want to trackback my early years, it’s the odyssey of an Asian nerd from the suburbs doing Gangster Rap videos.

North Korean press bus’s wrong turn shows off ugly side of Pyongyang
AP via San Jose Mercury News

The press bus took a wrong turn Thursday. And suddenly, everything changed in the official showcase of North Korean achievement.

A cloud of brown dust swirled down deeply potholed streets, past concrete apartment buildings crumbling at the edges. Old people trudged along the sidewalk, some with handmade backpacks crafted from canvas bags. Two men in wheelchairs waited at a bus stop. There were stores with no lights, and side roads so battered they were more dirt than pavement.

North Korea’s failed rocket launch raises fears of nuclear test
The Washington Post

In the aftermath of North Korea’s failed attempt to fire a rocket into orbit, leaders in Washington and Asian capitals moved Friday to condemn the authoritarian nation while also containing its next move — a balance that has proven elusive during previous confrontations.

The failure raised fears that North Korea could try to salve the wound to its national pride by conducting a new nuclear test.

Candor and Celebration on North Korean TV After Failed Rocket Launch
The New York Times

As my colleagues Choe Sang-hun and Rick Gladstone report, hours after a North Korean rocket disintegrated within minutes of launching on Friday, the country’s state media took the unusual step of admitting the failure.

Britain’s Telegraph added English subtitles to video of the announcement on North Korean state television.

The three-stage rocket, which North Korea said was carrying a communications satellite but outside observers called part of a missile test, flew for just over a minute before crashing into the Yellow Sea, Japanese officials said.

Later on Friday, North Korean state television returned to more regular programming, showcasing a mass celebration of the 100th anniversary of the birthday of the country’s founder, Kim Il-sung, grandfather of the new leader, Kim Jung-un.

US cancels food aid to North Korea after missile launch, warns of more sanctions
World News via MSNBC

The United States has canceled a proposed food aid deal with North Korea following over its attempt to launch a long-range rocket taking a satellite into orbit.

Senior administration officials told NBC News the deal with Pyongyang is off after the rocket was fired. It failed shortly after launch and landed in the sea off the South Korea coast.

“We are not going forward with an agreement to provide them with any assistance,” White House National Security Council spokesman Ben Rhodes told reporters traveling with President Barack Obama to Florida. He added that the U.S. and its allies will “take additional steps” if there are more “provocative actions.”

SK Netizens Express Fatigue With NK
The Wall Street Journal

As the world zoomed in on North Korea’s failed rocket launch Friday morning, South Koreans generally brushed off the event as they tend to do when the North grabs the headlines.

But the discussion online illustrated some of the frustration and fatigue with North Korea felt in the South.

Daum, the country’s second biggest portal site, opened a discussion page about the launch.

Here’s a selection of some of the posts:

“The money that was sent by (former presidents) Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun is shred into pieces in the air… We should take this opportunity to send all the North Korean sympathizers (in the South) to the North.”

“Thanks, we enjoyed your 800 billion won worth of fireworks.”

Why Jim Yong Kim Wants to Run the World Bank
The New York Times

This week, I had the opportunity to interview Dr. Jim Yong Kim, the Obama administration’s nominee to head the World Bank. Dr. Kim is the president of Dartmouth College and a public health expert. He is a physician and anthropologist, a founder of the nonprofit Partners in Health and a former World Health Organization official.

Dr. Kim is also the front-runner for the World Bank job, given that Europe customarily supports the American candidate for the bank, and the United States supports Europe’s candidate for managing director of the International Monetary Fund in turn.

But that does not mean that Dr. Kim’s nomination has met with universal praise. Commentators have questioned whether he has broad enough experience for the post, and questioned a decade-old book in which he critiqued the bank’s development approach. There has also been broad criticism of continued American leadership of the multilateral institution.

Bergen County politicians join Korean Americans in denouncing Senate’s treatment of Phillip Kwon
NJ.com

Bergen County politicians joined members of the Korean American community today in expressing outrage at the controversial rejection of Phillip Kwon’s nomination to New Jersey’s highest court.

“Every single day I get an email or a phone call or something from a Korean American, and non-Korean Americans, who are offended by this process,” State Sen. Kevin O’Toole said, referring to the Senate Judiciary Committee’s 7-6 vote to block Kwon’s nomination.

“That should never happen again,” he said. “And I’m hoping by having this discussion right here and right now, that it will never happen again.”

O’Toole and Bergen County Executive Kathleen Donovan convened the press conference to address the concerns of North Jersey’s growing Korean community, who have expressed concern with the political back-and-forth that lead to Kwon’s rejected nomination.

WABC/Ch. 7’s Liz Cho goes into the OR to uncover tales of organ donors
New York Daily News

Growing up in a house where dad was a pioneering transplant surgeon, Liz Cho was used to hearing about operations — and, yes, occasionally having a photo from the operating room mixed in with family vacation shots.

Because of that background, it was a no-brainer that Cho would be the choice to host “Connected for Life,” a special tied to National Organ Donor Awareness Month that stems from a partnership between WABC/Ch. 7 and New York Presbyterian Hospital.

“It was very much a part of my life growing up,” she says of organ donation.

“Connected for Life” airs Saturday at 7 p.m. It eyes how New York lags in donations and what can be done to improve the situation. Cho and executive producer Nancy Geraghty Kennedy provide a look through the eyes of the parents of an 18-month-old boy waiting for a new heart and the family of a 24-year-old man killed in a car accident whose organs were donated to others, including his former Little League coach.

Transmission LA: AV Club: Roy Choi, Mike D + Gangster Food Love
LA Weekly

It’s not as if Roy Choi (Chego, A-Frame, Kogi, the world) doesn’t have lots of things to do in his off hours, what few there are of them. But if Mike D (Beastie Boys, the world) asks you to cook some food, you’d probably do it to. Or, to quote the chef, “I don’t know where you come from but in my world if Mike D steps to me, I listen.”

What Mike D asked Choi to step into, so to speak, is Transmission LA: AV Club, a 17-day festival at the Geffen Contemporary at MOCA. As part of the festival, on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays from April 20 through May 6, Choi will run an outdoor pop-up restaurant, each day with a different original addition to the Kogi menu. Or, as Choi put it, “I want to extend what we do on the streets one step further into an exploration of flavor and straight gangster love.”

How wildlife is thriving in the Korean peninsula’s demilitarised zone
The Guardian (U.K.)

A thin green ribbon threads its way across the Korean Peninsula. Viewed from space, via composite satellite images, the winding swath clearly demarcates the political boundary between the Republic of Korea (ROK) and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). Its visual impact is especially strong in the west, where it separates the gray, concrete sprawl of Seoul from the brown, deforested wastes south of Kaesong. In the east, it merges with the greener landscapes of the Taebaek Mountain Range and all but disappears.

From the ground, the narrow verdant band manifests as an impenetrable barrier of overgrown vegetation enclosed by layers of fences topped by menacing concertina wire and dotted with observation posts manned by heavily armed soldiers. That a place so steeped in violence still teems with life seems unimaginable. And yet, the Demilitarized Zone, or DMZ, is home to thousands of species that are extinct or endangered elsewhere on the peninsula. It is the last haven for many of these plants and animals and the centre of attention for those intent on preserving Korea’s rich ecological heritage.

Forget RoboCop: Robo-guard Patrols Korean Prisons, Foresees Trouble
PC World

While there are a number of robots in fiction created to fight crime or hang out with the heroes of the plot line, few ideas for robotic cops have surfaced in real life. But prisons in South Korea are now testing a robot designed to make the roughest of cell blocks safer for both guards and prisoners.

Robo-guard displays its smarts in the way it interacts with humans: As it patrols corridors containing inmates, it can sense how a person is feeling. If it senses any abnormalities, it will transmit its data in real-time to the control center for further action.

Detention, Your High School on Skittles and Red Bull
Boston Globe

All the better to be beaten into submission by Joseph Kahn, who directed and co-wrote this movie and happens to be Korean-American and, beginning in the early 1990s, happens to have made an indigestible number of melt-in-your-mouth music videos.

Once upon a time, MTV had a feature called a rock block, in which it played a bunch of clips by a single artist. “Detention” is a Joseph Kahn rock block. Being forced to submit to it is like being assaulted by a bag of Skittles. But, eventually, a kind of clarity sets in – for us. The movie itself is never truly clear. If it’s also never intentionally bad, its unintentional badness keeps blasting into shockingly clever places.

This is ostensibly a prom-bound tangle of freaks and geeks. (The cast includes Josh Hutcherson, Spencer Locke, Shanley Caswell, Aaron David Johnson, Marque Richardson, and Principal Dane Cook). So-and-so likes such-and-such and on-and-on. But Kahn and his co-writer, Mark Palermo, toss in a 1992-bound time machine built inside an enormous animatronic bear; a bullying jock who’s also part housefly; a school-massacre detour; and a “Scream”/“Saw” horror-farce called “Cinderhella” that basically explains how a Lady Gaga slasher franchise would go. The kids wind up having to go back three decades in order to save themselves from themselves.

WED's Links: Asian Ams grab Obama’s attention, Jenna Ushkowitz, SK's 1st Chemical Castration Pedophile; Uglydoll Makers http://t.co/w9gRr0sH

Tuesday's Links: North Korea (again), K-Pop, Author Krys Lee, Man charged with slapping loud kid in theater http://t.co/DhC62HjN

The Ten Most Fashionable Asian-Americans In NYC http://t.co/oTE8EJCN

Just a reminder, the SMTOWN live streaming K-pop concert is going on ... right now! http://t.co/JywXQ91F

I uploaded a @YouTube video http://t.co/NnQFpSdq SMTOWN World Tour - EXO, SHINEE, f(x) Performance P.2