It is still a tradition to put to rest some minor remnant of colonial history before the major national holidays in Korea, March 1 and August 15 (Liberation day). Kim Young Sam undoubtedly tops the list of such acts with his demolition of the former government general building, later National Museum, which started on Aug. 15, 1995. However, I was surprised to confirm again the nationalist vigour of the Jogye order. These monks of Beomeosa (i.e. 범어사 – one example of how awful the current romanization system can be) are joyfully tearing down a small ballustrade, apparently in Japanase style, despoiling their pagoda, which is treasure no. 250. The idea is, as always, to restore it to ‘its original state.’ Not very enlightened behaviour, to say the least:
Another famous example that always shows up is that of the iron rods supposedly driven into the soil to destroy the geomantic power – or prevent the birth of great people, according to an 80-year old villager in Gangcheon, near Yeoju (Gyeonggi-do), where an example was recently recovered:
According to the report, the rod is about 4-5 cm in diameter and 50 cm out of the earth – it is not known yet how deep it is embedded in the earth. As a perceptive student in one of my classes once pointed out, it resembles a rod used in surveying land or rods used to delineate plots of land… As far as I know, nobody has yet seriously looked at any documentary evidence to back up the popular claims that these were meant to be some kind of voodoo needles to sap the strength out of Korea…
[...] contentious tender over the removal and replacement of ‘colonial buildings’ (see here for the symbolic removal of some of that colonial architecture) could be the culprit. In any case, [...]