Monday 24 May 2010

Kari Bari Blog

It’s 1915 France. Trenches oppose trenches. Faces face faces. Guns point at guns. Europe is at a stalemate.
Neither team will give in. It’ll take 3 more years, 16,000,000 deaths and cultural devastation before the deadlock will be broken.
It could have all been so much simpler; if only somebody had uttered those immortal words: “rock paper, scissor!”

It’s 2010 Korea. Two students stare each other down in class. They want desperately to give each other Chinese burns, flicks to the face, water boarding; all manner of things considered illegal under the Geneva Convention. (Read: OK ways to kill other people)
On of them utters those immortal words: “Kari, bari, bo!”

Rock paper scissor, or kari bari bo, to give it its Korean name, carries genuine weight over here. If a standstill unfolds, a last pizza slice is being sought by more than one, or a decision about immigration policy is splitting the cabinet; there’s only one way to resolve things in Korea, and the people have it down to a fine art.
People limber up before hand; celebrate victory like a world cup. I saw one man running in the mountains training for a particularly tough rock paper scissor contest.

My students first educated me in the ways of kari bari bo (it must be said in full each time, to shorten it would only devalue the bo, although I have no idea which that one is) and I presumed it was limited to school debates over distribution of pain and reading duties in class (to many students those aren’t mutually exclusive events.)

However, I underestimated the cultural reach of the game. Soldiers will use it to distribute duties, professional men to decide who gets the final soju shot. MPs over what to claim next on expenses.

It really does take over everything.

Both of you want to watch a different film? Kari bari bo!
Not sure where to holiday this year? Kari bari bo!
Debating which oil laden Middle Eastern country to invade next? Kari bari bo!

Despite all this, the system would just fall apart were it not for the fact it is adhered to strictly. If somebody loses they will perform what is asked of them with no question.

I even read of a criminal ring that has recently emerged in Seoul, filled with people playing Russian kari bari bo, or ножницы утеса бумажные in native tongue. The winner takes all the loser’s possessions, whilst the loser is killed by the hand that beat them. I.e. death by either rock scissor, or rather more trickily, paper. Being paper cut to death is pretty high on my ‘top 10 list of ways not to die.’

Both Koreas are technically still at war, since no armistice has ever been signed. It’s surprising the whole thing hasn’t being solved by kari bari bo, although, to be fair, in Kim Jong-Il’s case it would most likely be rock scissor nuclear warhead.

So why not tale a little Korea culture into your life today? Next time you’re mulling over debates such as: spend or save, holiday or house, jump or don’t jump; take the stress out of life. Just limber your wrist, pull back your arm and utter those immortal words: Kari Bari Bo!

Sunday 16 May 2010

Honesty in football ... no really

Not to sound smug about it, but my blogging has been tempered of late, due to the glorious weather we’re experiencing here in Korea.

It’s been hot, but not too hot, with a little wind and almost entirely dry; perfect weather for soccer, cricket, tennis – all manner of outdoor activities. And so it was that last week I found myself in a dingy student’s union with windows, playing ping-pong with a Jehovah’s Witness.

This isn’t a habit of mine, I was asked to play by a Korean friend going by the English name of Brian. Regular readers may remember him as the man who tries, on occasion, to convince me to believe blood transfusions are not needed during major surgery, and that snakes are capable of coherent conversation. Of course those of us with half a brain know all these beliefs have just plagiarised from Harry Potter.

Mental lapses aside, Brian is a nice guy, and so I agreed to play. In England, compared to the layman, I consider myself a decent table tennis player. Those who know their way around a table will most likely beat me, but those who ask what end of the bat to hold may fall to my less that dramatic spin. Brian claimed to be the same. I envisaged an even match. A gruelling encounter of Federer Roddick proportions. Two men sweating enough to rehydrate an African nation, grunting with all their masculine might; enough to make even the Williams’ sisters jealous.

It wasn’t to be. He destroyed me. The warm up went well enough. We traded gentle rallies, chatted between points, and occasionally during. It was all very lawn tennis. At one stage I found myself flirting with a vicar’s daughter whist Brian made us Pimms. I had found my calling card. A sport I could do without actually having to do much.

But then we started a real game. I took the first point and all was going well, but then Brian switched. Like the old man at the end of Street Fighter, he suddenly changed. Red ran into his eyes. He ripped his shirt through sheer muscle growth and began to scream. Then the massacre took place. I was well out of my depth in a sport that became scarier than I could imagine sport involving a 2gram ball could be. White bullets rained on me until 5 minutes later the torture was ended by a grinning Brian saying 11-1, do you want to play again?

He had told me he was only average, and the scary thing was, compared to other Koreans he is. I looked to the table next to me at two students having a quick rally before a night out. It took the ball stopping for me to realise there even was one. All I could see was a blurry white line linking their bats.

Ping Pong needs the kind of skills that Koreans excel at, the rest of Europe see as important, but we in Britain often struggle with in sport: technique, finesse and intelligence. Especially in football, the difference between Europeans and Koreans, is those skills are coupled with a strictly enforced honesty in Korea.

I play 5 a side on pitches around the city. The pitches have teams waiting around the edges and operate with 2 rules: first to 3 and winner stays on. There’s never a referee, but there’s no need. Honesty is expected, and so is self enforced. Handballs are admitted and fouls apologised for. In my entire time here I’ve played 5 a side over 30 times, and I’ve seen a disagreement once.

Teams order themselves on the side to determine who goes on next. There’s never a problem, just honesty. It truly is a fantastic thing to behold. Should the same thing happen in England, especially in a city centre, there would be arguments by the minute, voices raised as standard, and most likely a knife would enter the equation at some stage.

In 11 a side games, even with a referee, it’s exactly the same. Players won’t complain if they’re judged offside, they just get on with the game. There’s no nasty tackles ‘to let people know you’re there.’ If they handball and the referee doesn’t see it; no problem, it’s admitted to anyway. People here remember football is a game, to be enjoyed. The result won’t change a thing, and as long as they’ve given their all, which their tremendous work ethic demands they do, Koreans don’t let it change their mood either.

The best part is: it’s infectious. You can’t help but do the same. When such standards are expected as the norm, it creates an environment where you don’t want to look like the worst person on the field, an environment where nasty fouls aren’t cheered by small minded thugs, but condemned by all those watching; the perpetrator made to feel, rightly so, guilty.

In Korea, football really is the beautiful game, honestly.