Every Sunday evening I watch variety show about being married. At first, I just envied the couples and wanted to get married. Moreover, I take it for granted to get married if two people are falling in love each other  but now I don’t. Of course, I still want to get married but the thing is my thought about marriage has been changed. It’s more complicated than I thought and there is something more than that. While watching that show, I casted a doubt on my ability to handle the situations that I will face when I get married. It’s not only about love. It’s about me, my husband, our family and our friends. Then I realized that means a lot to me. I am not saying that marriage is bad but saying that we all should think seriously before making up our mind to get married. These days, getting divorce has became easier than before and many divorced people can live their lives like normal people but that doesn’t mean that the divorce doesn’t need to be the last choice. It should be the last thing to do and to avoid this we need to think ahead before making a huge mistake.

   “Harry Potter” is one of my favorite books and movies. Since I have watched the series of Harry Potter from the 1st to 4th I decided to see the 5th movie again which is the “Harry Potter and the order of phoenix” While watching it I found something interesting to think about. In this movie, the ministry of magic started to control the Hogwarts which means that the government interferes in the education in school. Two ideas flashed through my head. The first thing is the relationship between the government and schools. The second thing is what students can do and should do when it really happens.

   In my opinion, we can not eliminate the government when talking about schools because in some way schools need its help and it makes the education laws. For example, many Korean universities are receiving financial assistance from the government. However, government should regulate them as least as possible. Few years ago, in Korea, there was a heated argument about the government’s control over the universities’ way to pick students. At that time, I thought that the government go beyond bounds because schools have to right to pick students in whatever ways they want.

   Seceond, how should we behave when it really happens? In this movie, Harry and his friends think that it’s unfair and improper so they make a secret group to protest against the govenment power. I think we should do the same way if we are in this kind of situation because we have right to be educated in the better circumstances and express our own opinions. Although it’s illegal just like in this movie, we shouldn’t stop fighting againt it. If we let it happen, we will lose our power and voice just like we did about 50 years ago. I remember many people who fought against the vicious government and died for their faith.

   This movie can be just a fantasy movie to some of you but at leat to me and today, it definitely gave me something important to think about. Fortunatley, Harry Potter and his people win in the end of this series of books and movies as if it shows us that every justice wins.

   I decided to see this movie because there is James McAvoy who is one of my favorite actors. Anyway, this is a movie about the apprearance-for-apprearance principle which is common these days. Not only women but also men are obsessed with the idea of being looking good because people of today have a tendency to judge people by their appearances. This movie criticizes this problems. There is a woman whose name is penelope and who has pig’s noses and ears because of the curse given to their family long time ago. The curse is removed only when she found a noble who is in love with her regardless of her piggish looking. To make long story short, she finally finds a man who try to marry her but at the wedding, she realizes that she doesn’t want to be changed and she likes herself as the way she is so she refuses to marry him and comes back to home. At that time, the curse is released just like magic, which means she is the one who could have break the curse at the fisrt place not a noble or a lover. Through this movie, I started to think about many women in Korea who do plastic surgery and try to lose their weight to be looked more beautiful. They are the people who can not be satistied with their own appearance and do their best to fit themselves to the other people’s expectation. It’s stupid and it’s like a curse that is given to you by yourself. As you all know, if you can not be contented with yourself, you can never be happy. Happiness is up to you. Moreover, in the end of this movie, she also finds the man who truly love her and he has loved her since she had a pig’s nose.  I’m not saying she is lucky. I am saying that we all should become a person like him who can see the person’s inside. I guess that’s what this movis was made for.

   After arriving at home, I watched human documentary about male nurse. Usually we think nurses should be female and it has been but the number of male nurses are growing thesedays. According to the statement of my female friend who is studying in colleage to be a nurse, there was one female student in their school but now there are three. I guess we should not look at them as an odd person because gender gap in jobs are getting smaller. However, that doesn’t mean male nurses have no difficulties at all while working. First, male nurses have to survive among the female nurses. Since male nurses are still rare, they might not be able to fine any common threads with coworkers and that’s going to be very lonely. Second, male doctors are going to be the worst enemies to them because they will definitely look down on male nurses. Even though all legitimate trades are equally honorable, we unconsciously think that a doctor is a better job than a nurse especially to men. Because of this, male nurses will have to put up with the male doctors’ contempt. Though many people today think that everyone should be treated equally but ironically we tend to put down the people who try to destroy gender expectations. Think about yourself. Aren’t you one of them?

   When I read a neswpaper, I found something interesting everyday and usually it’s an article or editorial but today was differnt: it was an advertisement. The commercial was about the program to improve our English reading ability and there was a short essay. It was not the ad but the context that attracted me because it was a story about women in history who help their countried by spying. It says that the Virginia Hall is a good example because she was one of the bravest and most successful spies through out the whole history of spies. While reading it, I felt pity for them because their life must have been much tougher than that of any other normal men whether it was their choices or not. However, I’m sure that they were forced to do it because  anything can happen in this world and the govenment can ask citizens anything under the cloak of patriotism especially during the War. Also, to some women it could be the only way to live because there were nothing much that woman could do alone at that times different from nowadays. Of course, some people might have taken that job voluntarily like Virginia Hall but most of them were not and I still can imagine how hard and tough their lives would be. It’s sad that women had to live different lives from men’s and I guess we (women) still do even though many people insist that the world is changing. I believe we should think not only about the typical role expectation of women but also the exceptions because there are much more exceptions that we have expected in this world.

   There were many issues which is very interesting to me today and there was also a serious one like this.  According to the article, some personal data of a Cheong Wa Dae official were leaked in mid-February after the computer system was attacked by a malicious progran.  When I read this article, I was rather worried than shocked or surprised because I thought that many people who knew this accident would definitely cast a doubt on the security system of govenment. Cheong Wa Dae said the worm came through the NSC (National Security Council) official’s personal storage device and he will be punished for violating the security rules. However, I think that solution doesn’t mean anything because the government already lost their credit. I also believe this is why this incident is reported now which is 2 months later when it really happened. Then I started to think about the secrecy and publicy again related to this matter because to make people keep trusting government, this kind of information is good to be hidden but at the same time, citizens in this country have rights to know what’s going on in this country.  What do you say about this? Do you think this sort of information should be secert or publicized?

   Have you ever watched the TV show named “We are married!”? This is one of my favorite TV shows and I really enjoy watching it. In this show, there are 4 couples who pretended to be married and each couple  is dramatically different. Among them, what I want to talk about is Jung Hyung Don who is a husband of Saori in the show. He doen’t want to help his wife, acts like typical Korean husband who most women don’t like and almost every his word is based on patriarchy so Saori is distressed and annoyed at him. So were many female viewers.  Some people say he is the only husband in this show who is exactly realistic and there are no reasons for him to be blamed. On the other hand, other people say that he deserves to be spoken ill of because he is overly indifferent to his wife and he shouldn’t act like that. However, I would like to ask people who defend Jung Hyung Don a question. Does ‘realistic’ mean ‘ok’ or ‘alright’? Is his behavior ok enough to be forgiven only because it’s realistic? I don’t think so. (Of course, it’s a diffent problem that whether we have rights to blame him or not just because his acts are wrong)  He is nothing but an indiffernt husband and it’s not right and it’s not ok at all. He definitely needs to be changed and that’s the only way to make the viwers think that he is a good husband.  

   The bucket list is a list contained things to do before we “die”  This is originated from the phrase “kick the bucket” which means die. This is because in the execution by hanging, people usually have the prisoner stand on the bucket and kick it to kill him/her. Actually, this movie was pretty good except two things that I didn’t like.

   First, even though this movie made me think about the life and death one more time, almost everything on the bucket list is impossible if we don’t have enough money. Of course, things like “laugh until we cry” and “help other people” don’t need money but what about the traveling the world with personal airplane and car racing with an expensive car ? To the normal people like me, it looked totally impossible to do before I die. I just wish that the movie would be better if it focused more on simple things.

   Second, I could still can see the racial discrimination. Morgan Freeman who is black is a mechanic and Jack Nicholson who is white is a chairman of a conglomerate in this film. Why do always non-white people have lower social rank than the white. Moreover, in the movie, Jack Nicholson makes a black women hit on Morgan Freeman. Why a black woman? Why can’t be a white woman who attracts a black man? I thought this is unfair.

   I am not saying that this movie is a bad one. However, I could see the limitation of people’s thought about wealth and race and realized that we still have a long way to go.  

          Yesterday, I saw the article related to punishment of sexual criminals. People were trying to open their informations to the public. Of course, there are other people who don’t agree with it due to the matters of human right. I fully understand the both sides.

          If I am a victim or family members of victims, I could ask poilce to publicize their history for them not to commit that kind of crime again. However, what about criminals? Some of them might want to live a new life. What if their publicized criminal records make them unable to live normal lives? (This doesn’t apply to serial criminals) This problem is the crash of two moral values. One is the protection of privacy. The other is protection of citizens from dangerous crime.

          I don’t think opening informaions is a good idea. I am not saying that the human rights of criminals are first but it will not going to work. Do you think sexual assault and rapes will disappear if we let the public who sexual ciminals are? No, I don’t think so. Some people will still commit crimes. Moreover, there could be more crimes. Maybe innocent citizens would try to judge criminals be themselves. What are you gonna say about this problem?

CAUTION : This essay can be a spoiler so whoever will watch this movie, don’t read!

   This is a movie directed by Korean director Lee, Ji-ho who is a husband of Korean actress, Kim Min. After watching this movie, two things came into my head. One is what the title of this movie means. The other is the identitiy of this movie.

   First, there are 4 emotions in this movie and they are happy, pleasure, sorrow and love. In the end of this movie, we can find that 4 different stories are connected to each other. That means 4 feelings – happy, pleasure, sorrow, love – are not seperated eventually. We sometimes think that being sad is differnt from being happy but this movie tells us that eveythings are connected. Therefore, the title of this movie has significant meaning, which “The Air I breathe” is “The Air you breathe” and “The Air we breahte”.  I wonder what you think. Do you agree with the idea that everythings are connected?

   Second, I’m not sure if we can say this is Korean movie or not. Even though the director of this movie is Korean and the scenario is written by Korean, actors and actress in this  movie are still Americans. Moreover, in this movie, there’s somthing that we can feel Korean. I don’t know exactly what are they but I could definitely feel something is different from just Hollywood movies. I wish to know how the identity of movie is determined and what factors make Korean moviea Korean things.   What do you say about this?

   There are many movies directed by Korean. Nevertheless the reason why I particulary focus on this one is because we can not find anything directly related to Korea in this movie unlike the other one such as “The War” directed by Shim, Hyung-rae. In “The War”, people are talking about Korean history but in “The Air I breate”, we can not hear any talking about Korea at all. Still, we can feel something about Korean. That’s exactly what I want to figure out. I’d like you to watch this movie and answer to my questions above.