Korean Military: Sex (Part 1)
As has been mentioned in the past two articles in my series on the Korean military, I spent a year as a civilian English training officer on a Korean Air Force base.  During that time, I got close to many of the students–both enlisted and officers–that came through my classroom (usually for 3 months at a time). I hung out with them, partied with them (from time to time), and learned as much as I could from them. One of the things I learned about was their attitudes towards sex, especially sex for sale. I’m going to start out this article with an account of one of my classes. This class was composed of eight enlisted personnel, ranging in rank from í•

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Updated: Buddhist Rites of Initiation
A photograph has been added to the last post.

Buddhist Rites of Religious Initiation
As some may know, I am a Buddhist. While many assume I became a Buddhist as a result of my time spent in Asia, in fact I became a Buddhist while staying at a monastery near San Diego, California. However, in my third year in Korea, I happened to befriend a monk who ran a very small temple near my workplace. We would have lunch after Sunday services. After a month of this, he invited me to perform sugye (수계), the Korean Buddhist initiation ritual. The ritual involves formally taking refuge in the three jewels of Buddhism: the Buddha, the Dharma (teaching), and the Sangha (community), and accepting the five precepts (enumerated below). During the ritual, the

Abortions in Korea
Recently on a post over at Hub of Sparkle, Western Confucian talks about abortions in Korea. I have a friend who is a doctor in Korea, and I asked him about Korea’s ban on abortions. Here is what he had to say (paraphrased from memory): In Korea, it is illegal to perform elective abortions. Because of this, most doctors performing abortions will report that the abortion was necessary for the health of the mother. According to the post on Hub, a group of gynecologists is banding together to take doctors performing illegal abortions to task. That seems difficult if doctors can claim it is for the health of the mother, and patients of course won’t be com