Migrant mothers pass on mother tongues

There are certain first moments that are magical for mothers: The birth of their first child, when their child makes first eye-contact, their child’s first steps, and the first time their child says the word “mother.” 

For Tsagaan Ankhtuya from Mongolia, that last magical moment took four years.

“I forced myself to speak Korean to my son for the first three years of his life,” said Ankhtuya, who left her home country to marry a Korean taxi driver eight years ago. “People told me if I spoke Mongolian to my child, he would fail to speak any languages at all so I at least wanted him to speak Korean properly.”

Ankhtuya realized what she had been told was totally wrong when she first visited a multicultural library called Modoo, meaning “all-together,” in Imun-dong, Seoul. Unlike many other Korean-immersion multicultural institutions, the library staff encouraged her to speak her own language to her child. It is still emotional for Ankhtuya to recall the moment when her son first called her “aeja,” “mother” in Mongolian when he was 4. 

“I felt this must be it,” she said. “This is how it’s supposed to feel when your child calls you mother. I never got such a feeling when he called me ‘eomma’ ‘mother’ in Korean the whole time. It just wasn’t the same.”

Opened in 2008, the library Modoo is small in size but unique in style. It is one of the very few multicultural institutions in Korea that offer a cross-cultural learning environment involving migrant mothers’ mother tongues and cultures. 
 

Tsagaan Ankhtuya (far right), a migrant mother from Mongolia, poses with other immigrant mothers at a multicultural library Modoo in Imun-dong, Seoul (Claire Lee/The Korea Herald)

Filled with books from Mongolia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Japan, China and even Iran, the library offers both resources and reading education for migrant mothers and their children who are unfamiliar with Korean culture and language. 

But they don’t just learn Korean language at Modoo. Parents read stories from their home countries to their children in their mother tongue books they had read as children. 

Sung Ji-yeon, one of the officials at the library, said learning about their mother’s native culture and language is very important for children of multicultural families in Korea. 

“It tells them it is more than okay to be different,” said Sung, “and be proud of who they are, and who their mothers are.”

According to Sung, many mothers who come to the library have not spoken a word to their newborn child until they entered kindergarten. 

“Most of them don’t speak Korean very well and are forced not to speak their native language to their child by those around them,” Sung said. “So they end up not speaking at all. And not having enough verbal communication with their mother as a newborn can severely damage a child’s intellectual and psychological development.

“Most of these women marry Korean men of low-income households. Many family members on their husbands’ side don’t know much about what to do. They just assume that if a child learns a foreign language as a baby, they won’t be able to learn any languages later on, and force such an idea to the migrant mothers. 

“But it’s scientifically proven that young children are capable of learning multiple languages at the same time; having a bilingual environment only betters their linguistic development and cultural understanding.”

The National Folk Museum of Korea’s new multicultural learning resource, Cultural Discovery Boxes, which contain audio-visual materials and cultural bjects from Vietnam and Mongolia (Claire Lee/The Korea Herald)

Hence every mother who visits Modoo for the first time is encouraged to make a special statement, called the “mother tongue nurture declaration.” It is designedto remove the undeserved sense of guilt women have about their inability to speak Korean, and to encourage them to proudly start speaking their mother tongue to their children. 

For many women, it’s a very emotional moment.

“I am the mother,” the declaration says. “The words come out of my heart, for my lovely child has my soul and duty toward him ... so when the time my child has to walk alone on the road of his life, these words can be a guide for his mind and soul.” 

Established by a non-profit organization Purun Citizen Community, Modoo has managed to collect 1,000 books from more than seven countries. But for cultural education sessions, it’s always good to have resources such as costumes and traditional artifacts. 

Last month, the National Folk Museum of Korea introduced two special “CultureDiscovery Boxes” about Mongolia and Vietnam, two of the many Asian countries where a high number of women marry Korean men. The cultural resources are exclusively researched and designed for multicultural education, especially for children of foreign-born migrant mothers. 

“Up until now, multicultural education in Korea has been extremely Korea-oriented,” said Jang Jang-sik, senior curator the museum, who has visited Mongolia numerous times to collect cultural items. 

“The kids would only read and write in Korean, and only learn about Korean culture. Now that has to be changed. Multicultural education must be cross-cultural and develop mutual understanding. Both Korean children and multicultural children need to learn about other cultures, where their mothers or their friends’ mothers are from.”

Supported by the Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism, the boxes contain audio-visual materials, as well as cultural objects ranging from an elementary school report card in Vietnam to traditional silver plates from Mongolia. Each drawer of the boxes will have traditional costumes, musical instruments, puppets, maps and reading material. Participating children will be able to touch, observe, imagine, listen and “try on” the culture and stories of almost every nook and cranny in Vietnam and Mongolia.

While the two big boxes will always remain in the museum for visiting children and teachers, 14 boxes of smaller size, categorized by different themes such as history, food, culture and music, will be available for free rental to any multicultural institution in the country.

“There are so many tragedies and problems with regards to migrant women and mothers in Korea,” said Jang. “We hope this project can ease and heal such conflicts.”

According to the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, over 150,000 immigrants currently live in Korea, married Korean men. More than 45 percent of them have experienced domestic violence within the past year. In July, a 20-year-old Vietnamese woman was killed by her husband only eight days after arriving in Korea. Last week, another married immigrant from Mongolia was stabbed to death by the husband of her friend.
source:Korea Herald

Korea too is enlisted among the supporters for the New Nalanda University is to be Built in India, near Nalanda site

Ancient Nalanda University in India - Wikimedia Images

Plans are afoot to build a new Nalanda University, to become a centre of learning for Asia. Will this university rival the fame of ancient Buddhist Nalanda?

The ruins of of the great university of Nalanda still stand and have been registered for World Heritage site listing, but this famed seat of learning may soon be resurrected. The passing of the Nalanda University Bill by the Indian Parliament in August 2010 heralds a new cycle in Indian education and, if all proposals are met, perhaps there will soon be a new Asian university which will rival the status of Oxford, Cambridge or Harvard. Nalanda is located approximately 55 miles away from Patna in Bihar State, India.

New Nalanda University to be Built in India

Plans are in hand to build a new Nalanda University on 500 acres (200 hectares) of land very close to the ruins of the ancient University. There are only 350 universities in the rapidly-developing country of India, yet the population is now approaching 1.2 billion people.

The plan to resurrect Nalanda is one way that Asia hopes to halt the trend for Asian students to pursue further studies in England, Australia or America. Further, the development of Nalanda is planned as a centre of excellence for learning and it is hoped that students will be attracted from across Asia. Certainly harnessing the history of ancient India, and the reputation of Nalanda, for establishing new centres of educational excellence is likely to raise renewed interest in the area from across the globe. The new University should also raise the profile of impoverished Bihar State too. It is to be hoped that this new Nalanda University will be able to achieve just some of the renown of the ancient Nalanda.

Ancient Nalanda University, a Renowned Centre of Learning

Nalanda was a renowned Buddhist monastery and university from the 5th century onwards. Historians can definitely date Nalanda University back to the 5th century, but earlier records state that the monastery may have existed from around 150AD. Nalanda was patronised by many Emperors and Kings and was visited by a number of well known Asian scholars. The university and monastery were destroyed by Muslim invaders in 1193. It is recorded that thousands of monks were burnt alive or beheaded and that the vast libraries took up to three months to burn.

To have studied at Nalanda was classed as very prestigious, although no formal qualifications or degrees were issued and there was no time limit to lengths of study. The monks measured time by means of a water clock and there were strict divisions between time for study and time for religious practices. Entry to the university was granted by learned gatekeepers who would conduct oral examinations with the hopeful students. Many potential students were turned away from the gates of Nalanda.

During the most successful period of the university, there were 10,000 students and 2,000 teachers based on the Nalanda site. Students flocked to Nalanda from as far afield as China, Greece, Tibet, Indonesia, Japan, Turkey and Persia. The students and scholars explored all known fields of learning from science and astronomy to scriptures and foreign philosophy. The library buildings were up to nine-storeys high and were the largest repository of Buddhist knowledge in the world.

Some of the supporters already enlisted for the construction of the new Nalanda University come from India, Singapore, Japan, Korea and China. It really does seem that this may herald a new light for education in Asia and one more sign of the burgeoning wealth and influence of the region.

Source:

suite101.com

Vice Minister delivers a special lecture at Cheongju University

Vice Minister Uhm delivered a special lecture to 400 students and faculty members of Cheongju University on September 15, under the theme of “Creativity and Challenge in a global era.”

In this special lecture, Vice Minister explained “three communities plan for unification,” basic concept and contents of unification tax, and appropriate inter-Korean relations after the sinking of the Cheonan.

In the meantime, Vice Minister stressed that young students should be minors who have creativity to lead future Korea, and discussions about national unification should actively take place at universities to prepare unification in the near future.

The audience showed a lot of interest in 1) the government’s stance about rice assistance to North Korea, 2) tourism business in North Korea including Mt. Geumgang tour, and 3) MOU plans to hold open discussions about national unification among university students.

source:Ministry of Unification

Multicultural kids

Nation should avoid reverse discrimination 

All multicultural children will be able to receive free daycare services from next year. This is a welcome proactive move by the nation toward embracing multi-ethnicity. Yet, the program may trigger a dispute over reverse discrimination against Korean kids. 

The government announced Thursday that a total of 28,000 multicultural children will be the beneficiary of free daycare services from their birth until they reach five. Regardless of income level, their parents can receive a state subsidy to enroll their kids in daycare centers. This is a major departure from the current policy. As of now, only multicultural parents whose monthly income is below 2.58 million are eligible to benefit from the welfare program. 

This is a desirable step to inject vitality into the nation through a proactive immigration policy. The multicultural families enjoy a right not granted to Korean families with children of the same-age. Korean parents are eligible for the program only when a family of four has a monthly income of less than 4.5 million won. The threshold rises to six million won for a double-income family. About 70 percent of Korean families with children have access to the program. All multicultural families will be beneficiaries. Although there are rich multicultural families here that will benefit as well. 

In its immigration policy, Seoul should not discriminate foreigners who naturalized themselves to become Koreans vis-a-vis locals in state welfare programs. It is also equally important for the government not to give them privileges, a potential source of future social conflict over reverse discrimination. 

It is also important for the government to provide welfare services only to those registered immigrants who have a tax record. Those with no tax records should be excluded. 

From next year, the government will hire 100 instructors to help immigrants learn the Korean language. President Lee Myung-bak said that the government should take care of multicultural kids in providing daycare services and language training. He said the programs are necessary as their foreign mothers are not fluent in Korean. 

The multicultural children born between a Korean and a foreigner are clearly Koreans. The government support should not be limited only to free daycare services. They should not face difficulty in getting a good education. There are occasional reports that they are ill-treated as black sheep at schools. Beyond state subsidies, Korean children should receive orientation not to alienate their multicultural peers in class. If they prematurely drop out of school, they will become a liability to the society. 

Korea will have no choice but to adopt a proactive immigration policy as the birth rate is one of the lowest in the world. Without input from immigrants, Korea will have difficulty in maintaining vitality in society and contributing to the economy. 

Some even propose that the government accept 2 million immigrants, 4 percent of the population, to offset the falling birth rate. This is in sharp contrast with many Western countries where immigrants have become a burden for the citizens suffering from the global economic downturn.


source:Korea Times

World Heritage site Hahoe Village keeps Confucian traditions alive

 ANDONG, North Gyeongsang Province To a background of sharp music, masked commoners let out the inner anger and sadness they have suppressed serving the noblemen through satirical words and acting.

The mask dance drama, Hahoe Byeolsingut Talnori, was the only way Korean commoners could get even with the nobility in the rigid class society of the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910).

“I’ve never seen a nobleman and a scholar fight over a cow’s testicles to get healthy in my entire life. Isn’t it funny?” shouts an 80-year-old grandma to the audience during the show.

A view of the Hahoe Village from Buyongdae Cliff across the Nakdong river

The spectators laugh out loud when a cow urinates at them. 

In the final act of five characters dancing together, actors invite Korean andforeign tourists to the stage to join in the dance.

Even though there is no screen with foreign-language subtitles to help tourists understand what the actors are saying, they seemed to have got the gist of the satire just by watching the wildly exaggerated acting.

“It was quite fun and I could guess what was going on,” said 30-year-oldSpanish tourist Veronica Gallego, who danced with the actors.

The tradition of masked-dance drama almost came to an end in 1928 under Japanese colonial rule as they attempted to annihilate Korean culture, according to Yim Hyeong-gyu, 58, who played the nobleman in the drama.

“When I was 20, in 1973, I joined the Andong Hahoe Mask Dance Institute to revive the Byeolsingut. But the conservative Andong people were mostly against the idea at the time,” he said.

Despite the difficulties, the Byeolsingut was designated by the government as an important intangible cultural asset in 1980.

The Hahoe Byeolsingut Talnori is a regular mask dance drama of the Hahoe Village, the most well-known historic clan village in Korea situated in Andong, North Gyeonggi Province. It is held at the Training Hall for the Inheritance of the Hahoe Byeolsingut Mask Dance Play, at the mouth of the Hahoe village, every Saturday and Sunday from May to October and every Sunday in March, April and November.

‘The whole Hahoe Village is an open museum’

The Hahoe Village has both tile-roofed and thatched-roofed traditional houses.(Kim Yoon-mi/The Korea Herald)

Hahoe Village was added to the UNESCO’s World Heritage site on July 31 for its unique layout and location having forested mountains behind and facing out onto the Nakdong River and open agricultural fields plus its reflection of the distinctive aristocratic Confucian culture of the early Joseon era.

The village became internationally famous when Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II visited the village to celebrate her 73rd birthday and called it the most Korean traditional spot in the nation.

Now, Andong City is upping its promotion of Hahoe village on the back of the UNESCO designation.

“Although the addition of the village to the World Heritage site was 10th such site in Korea, it was the first time that a village was enlisted,” said Kwon Young-sae, Andong City mayor.

“As the village has centuries-old houses where people still keep their unique lifestyle, the entire village is an outdoor museum,” he said.

Hahoe, representing the single Yu clan for 600 years, has both tile-roofed and thatched-roofed houses nicely clustered together, with the S-shaped Nakdong River coursing around them.

In the middle of the village, a 600-year-old tree called Samsindang, stands on the highest point in the village. Around the tree hang numerous white notes left by visitors, wishing luck for their children. 

About 1 million visitors come to Hahoe village each year and the number of visitors has increased around 1.5 times after the World Heritage listing, Kwon said.

With daily arrival in the village averaging around 5,000, Andong City limits entryif the number of visitors at the village exceeds 20,000 at any given time.

Most of the foreign visitors are Japanese, as they seemingly find comfort in the old houses and streets of the village, Kwon said.

The Andong International Mask Dance Festival, featuring both traditional Korean and international mask dance performances, will be held from Sept. 24 to Oct. 3. The festival includes a mask parade with participation of all visitors wearing masks. In the evening during the festival, the Hahoe Village will revive ancient-style poem writing, boat riding and a fire party called Seonyujulbul Nori, once enjoyed by the literati, or yangban. 

Audience members react as the cow character urinates during the mask dance drama ahoe Byeolsingut Talnori. (Kim Yoon-mi/The Korea Herald)

Strolling inside the quiet Hahoe offers a chance to see how the yangban taught their teenage children, at Confucian schools called seowon.

One of the major seowon academies in Hahoe is Byeongsan Seowon, which was established in 1614 by Confucian scholars in tribute to Yu Seong-ryong, a prime minister of the Joseon Dynasty in the late 16th century. Yu was a follower of Yi Hwang, the prominent Neo-Confucian scholar, whose portrait now appears on the 1,000 won bill.

“The name Byeongsan comes from the description of how the academy was surrounded by wall-like mountains,” said tour guide Lee Jun-yong.

Great influence by Yi Hwang and Dosan Seowon

About an hour-drive northeast of Hahoe Village is Dosan Seowon, a privateConfucian academy which was built in 1574 by disciples of Yi Hwang four years after he died.

Just like Byeongsan Seowon in Hahoe, the Confucian academy complex is also sheltered by a mountain and faces out onto the Nakdong River, following the rules of feng shui, or geomancy. 

Also known by his pen name Toegye, Yi Hwang started to build Dosan Seodang or lecture hall, in 1549 after retirement for the purpose of education and commemoration of ancestors.

“Toegye wrote himself a signboard saying ‘Nongunjeongsa’ for the student dormitory, which still hangs here, to tell students to keep their integrity once they become government officials,” Lee said.

The sign board saying “Dosan Seowon,” hung in the main lecture hall Jeongyodang, was written by famous mid-Joseon calligrapher Han Seok-bong but the original signboard is preserved at the near-by Advancement Center for Korean Studies (ACKS) in Andong, he said.

Jangpangak, where about 3,000 wooden blocks were stored for reprints of works of Yi Hwang and King Seonjo, is now empty as the wooden blocks have been transferred to ACKS for safe keeping.

Wooden blocks hold history

A visit to the ACKS allows an in-dept look at how old clans in Andong stored wooden blocks to print books about their history.

The state-run research institute has collected about 60,000 wooden blocks from individual families in its own Jangpangak building over the past several years. 

“If the number surpasses 80,000, we plan to enlist them on the UNESCO Memory of the World,” said Kwon Jin-ho, research director of wood-blocks at the ACKS.

Of the 60,000 wooden blocks stored here, 80 percent are from individual family’s collection of works and they are deemed to have been created from the 1560s until the 1930s, Kwon said.

“Considering that the yangban did not have much money and that the cost of making one wooden block was huge, it is amazing that they have kept this culture of keeping records for hundreds of years,” he said.

Even though the wooden blocks preserved at the ACKS are not open to the general public, a special group reservation for a brief look is possible by appointment.

The research institute also plans to open an exhibition next year of the original signboards, which were hung on the old houses of Hahoe and several seowonbuildings.

“We cannot open the Jangpangak building to the public because there is a dam near here. Frequent fogs mean high levels of humidity might damage the blocks,” Kwon said.

To get to Andong from Seoul, it takes about three hours by bus and four and a half by train. For more information, call (054) 856-3013 or visit www.tourandong.com. For information about mask dance, visit www.maskdance.com.


Source:Korea Herald

Koreas agree on October family reunion, location still undecided

Elderly South Koreans, who were separated from their families during the 1950-53 Korean War, hold a traditional ritual for their deceased relatives at Imjingak peace park in Paju in North Korea, near the inter-Korea border, on Tuesday.

Seoul, South Korea (CNN) -- Representatives for North and South Korea agreed that October would be a good time to do another round of reunions for families separated by the Korean war, the South Korean Unification Ministry said Friday.

But both sides are still negotiating details such as where the reunion will be. If talks do not go well on where the reunions will be, the event could be canceled.

The two sides agreed to hold the reunions on October 21 to 27. They could not agree on how many families to include in the reunion, and where it should be held, the ministry said.

The North had proposed resuming the reunions, which traditionally happen around the Koreas' autumn harvest holiday. It falls on September 22 this year.

Two Red Cross officials and 14 delegates from South Korea crossed the armed border into North Korea on Friday morning to meet with counterparts, according to the Yonhap news agency.

Millions of families were separated by the Korean War, which ended in 1953 with a cease-fire, but no formal peace treaty.

About 10,000 people applied to take part in a similar reunion last year, but fewer than 200 families were allowed to participate.

Family members wept as they saw one another for the first time in decades. No mail, telephone or e-mail exchanges exist between ordinary citizens across the Korean border.

Yoon Ki-Dal, 88, of South Korea thought such a moment would never come. After leaving his son and daughters when they were babies during the Korean War, he was able to hold the hands of his North Korean children last September.

"Father, we thought you were dead," his daughter, who was in her 60s, told him, her face trembling.

The families were allowed to spend a few days together before the South Koreans had to return home.

source:CNN