Last night I learned what a German song (99 luft baloons) means from a New Zealander while we were sitting in an apartment of an Indian-American fellow in Korea.

You gotta love it.
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Last Sunday I went to see "Sar-in-ui Chu-ok" (Memories of Murder) with a colleague from work. It's a great film -- please catch it in the States if ever it comes out there. Even though I didn't understand most of the language (a lot of swearing and slang), I understood the storyline and the events perfectly well, and could appreciate the delicate balance of humor and grimness in the film.

The film is based on true events. As my colleague explains it, in 1986, in a small town near Seoul, 12 women were murdered by the same person. Because Korea was under the rule of a military dictator at the time (though he was called president) who was obsessed with anti-communism propaganda, not a lot of resources were put into solving the crime. To this day, the murderer has never been caught. Although the film only once directly shows one of the many student protests for democracy, the film revives the fear and the uncertainty of those times for Koreans.

I didn't catch any of that while I saw the film. It was just a great film.

Also saw X-Men 2, on Saturday night. Awesome. I was a little disappointed that Kelly Hu, the other adamantian (sp?)-filled mutant, didn't have much screen time and spoke very little. I and the two Korean-Americans I went with (oops, no, one is Korean-Canadian) noticed, however, that there were actually two or three more Asian actors in the film, which we were happy about, but also that they all died, which we chalked up to "the black guy always bites it" rule of film.

Oh, and Wolverine is hot. (Which is not the case in the comic books -- he's supposed to be 5'3", but I guess that wouldn't have sold as many tickets.)

But what I really want is the Matrix. Opening this Friday here. Give me Neo or give me death!