Merry Christmas and Happy New Year and happy any other holiday you celebrate! There are some articles with links to K-pop Christmas song covers below for you to enjoy. Christmas is a big holiday in Korea, as well as in other East Asian countries. Hope you have some time to enjoy the songs and videos you like over break. When we finally return to school at some point in the new year we will start the K-pop club once again!
Winter Break is here, hope you have a great Christmas or other holiday and a much, much better and very much happier New Year!
After one of the worst years in history, the New Year is almost here. Hopefully everyone did their schoolwork and finished up the Fall Semester in a positive way. In any case Winter Break is here, a time to have fun and to think about the upcoming year. I hope everyone's family is safe and well and hopefully employed and secure. I believe that 2021 will be a seriously much, much better year. Here is a list of things that will make it better:
The vaccines are approved and ready to be administered. Both the Moderna and Pfizer vaccine are being given to people that need it the most. Kids will likely get it in the late spring to summer.
Christmas and all of the winter holidays, past and present!
Winter solstice, which we talked about yesterday, is only the beginning of the winter holidays. This year Google celebrated the winter solstice with a little doodle you can see above, that was on their website yesterday. There are many modern and ancient holidays to choose from in December, as well as the traditional Christian holiday that most of us celebrate, Christmas. As many of us know, the holiday of Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ, whom many people throughout the world consider to be the savior, or a kind of ultimate super hero that gives us a way out of bad behavior called sin. Jesus was Jewish and he himself possibly celebrated another important December holiday called Hanukah. This Jewish celebration is not one of the most holy days in the Jewish calendar, but it important and does involve giving presents like Christmas. It celebrates an uprising called the Second Maccabean revolt against the non-Jewish rulers of Israel, when the Jewish people drove their rulers out of Jerusalem about 200 BC and then lit candles in their holy temple to celebrate. This is where the Menorah, a kind of candle holder, comes from. You may have seen this symbol in stores or other places.
In ancient Rome, there was a very important holiday called Saturnalia that occurred in the week before Christmas. It celebrated the god Saturn, who was the god of agriculture. In ancient Rome during this holiday, slaves and masters exchanged roles, people had parties and gave each other the greeting "Io Saturnalia!", similar to "Merry Christmas". Another later Roman holiday around Christmas was the Dies Natalis Solis Invicti, which celebrated a Roman god called Sol Invictus, the 'unconquered sun'. The birth of the sun was celebrated in the later Roman empire on December 25, the same days as Christmas.
Saturnalia
There are and were many holidays around the world at this time. Christmas and Kwanzaa, Hanukah and soon the East Asian lunar New Year celebrated in Chinese areas, Japan, Vietnam and Korea. Some holidays are very ancient and some are newer. Hopefully this year we will be able to celebrate whichever one we choose in a safe and happy environment.
Today is the shortest day of the year, and it is called the winter solstice. It occurs because it is the time that for those of us who live in the northern hemisphere, which means the northern part of the globe, when our part of the earth is farthest from the sun. This is part of the seasonal cycle. In the summer our part of the earth is the closest to the sun and the summer solstice is when we have the longest day of the year. The summer solstice is June 20, while the winter solstice is 6 months later, on December 21. As you might know, the seasons are caused by the tilting of the earth. Summer occurs when Waukegan is closer to the sun and winter occurs when our community is farther from the sun. The farther north on the globe a location is, the shorter the days in the winter and also the longer the days in summer. The length of daylight today is about 9 hours, 7 minutes and 45 seconds in Waukegan, which is the shortest time all year. In the arctic in Alaska or Russia, there is no daylight at all today in some places. Meanwhile in the southern hemisphere, in Argentina, Chile or Australia, today is the summer solstice because seasons are reversed south of the equator. For places that are directly on the equator, such as Singapore, there is no real difference in daylight and there are no seasons. It is always summer and tropical in places right on the equator.
In ancient times many people believed that the winter and summer solstices had an important religious significance. For example in ancient Rome, there was a seven day festival called Saturnalia that took place at this time. Similarly in other parts of Europe and Asia there are festivals and religious ceremonies to commemorate the shortest day of the year, including at the ancient Neolithic shrine of Stonehenge in England, which was constructed to show the seasons and solstices.
Tonight there will be an additional astronomical treat, the Christmas star. Once in a very long time, the last time in the year 1227, Jupiter and Saturn will be so close that they will appear to be a single, bright planet. This is called the Christmas Star and it is very rare. (like once every 800 years!) Tonight along with the winter solstice there will also be the Christmas star, which is a symbol of hope after a pretty bad 2020.
A second vaccine has been approved, elderly people are getting vaccinated and maybe we will return to school in the New Year!
Well the year 2020 is almost over! I don't think that any of us will be sorry to see it go. But good news is here and better times are coming. Thursday a second vaccine was to be approved by the FDA. The company is Moderna and its vaccine also has about a 95% success rate. This vaccine is better in some ways because it can be stored in a normal refrigerator, not the super-cold refrigeration required by the Pfizer vaccine. But in most ways it is pretty similar. It is safe and only a few people might develop some allergic reaction to the vaccine.
In addition elderly people in nursing homes are now getting the vaccine along with healthcare workers. As you might know, many elderly people have gotten the virus in nursing homes and unfortunately some of them have died because as we get older our immune systems become weaker. Thankfully many of these elderly people will get the vaccine very soon.
New barriers being installed in our schools
Finally, it is quite possible that because of the vaccine we will return to school after the holidays at some point. While we have all been learning online, the schools have been made safe for our return with barriers and plexiglass shields being put up. Now that there are two vaccines, we may be able to return in the new year!
Question: what are you looking forward to in 2021?
Dwain Williams, retired Chicago firefighter killed by a 15 year-old carjacking suspect
Sadly, the United States in many urban areas is experiencing a significant crime wave, a lot of it being committed by young people. The picture above shows a retired Chicago firefighter, a 65 year-old man named Dwain Williams who had retired two years ago and was murdered by a 15 year-old suspect during a car jacking in Chicago's southwest side earlier this month. He was simply buying his favorite kind of popcorn at a snack store when a group of young people attempted to steal his car and they were armed with guns. Dwain Williams had his own gun and returned fire, possibly striking some of the suspects. But Mr. Williams himself was hit in the abdomen and died shortly after the incident in the hospital. He had a wife and adult children that are now mourning his loss. This is just one of the tragic crimes that have been increasing in number over the summer and into the fall. In Minneapolis for example, the city in which George Floyd died in police custody, violent crime including carjackings and armed robbery have gone up a lot.
As you can see in the graph above, violent crime has increased from about 32,000 cases in 2019 to about 38,000 cases in 2020. This is a large increase Similarly in Chicago too, there has been a pretty dramatic increase in violence that has led to many young people being killed and injured both intentionally and unintentionally by getting caught in the cross-fire. See the chart below:
What is the cause of this increase in crime that is harming so many people like Dwain Williams? According to some sources the stresses from Covid 19 and the lockdowns have contributed to the crime wave. Other people state that a lack of access to PPE, personal protective equipment, in some communities may to blame for the crime increase. However, another group of commentators say that since the George Floyd protests and the pandemic, police have cut back on arresting people and the justice system has chosen to not punish people for smaller crimes such as shoplifting and minor traffic offenses. In many cities such as New York, Seattle and San Francesco, some people accused of crimes are released without bail back into the public, where some of them commit the same crimes again shortly after being released. In Seattle, a place that has a very large number of homeless people, many of whom are drug addicts, alcoholics and mentally ill, has decriminalized shoplifting, using drugs in public and going to the bathroom outside in front of other people. This may be contributing to the rise n crime rates in cities where new laws have been enacted. Some of these cities have also cut funding to the police after the George Floyd protests, which means fewer police officers able to respond to crimes.
Some of the young people killed in Chicago in 2020
One major example of the increase in violent crime among teens, and even preteens, is in Oakland, California. CBS Bay Area news writes that:
"Police have seen an uptick in the number of young people
involved in armed carjackings and robberies in Oakland and warn
residents to be vigilant while getting in and out of their cars. Police
say officers have arrested middle-school age suspects who have held
victims at gunpoint.
So according to Oakland, California police, some of the kids getting involved in armed robbery and carjackings are only 11 years old! This is a very serious problem involving teens today. What do you think is the reason it is happening now and what can be done to prevent it?
Question: What do you think is causing the current crime wave and how do you think it could be stopped?
Some motels are crime magnets; should they be closed down?
Just like some abandoned buildings in high crime areas, some motels can become magnets for criminal activity. Drug use, vice (i.e. prostitution) and gang activity become associated with some older, run-down motels as well as some newer locations as well. In Waukegan there are motels that have become places where crimes are frequently committed. For example, a woman was found murdered in an older motel on Belvidere last March, and it wasn't until November that the police were able to solve the crime and arrest the woman's assailant, a man from Chicago. Similarly, on Greenbay road there is a newer motel that had at least two shootings within two weeks of each other over the summer. Should these businesses be allowed to continue to operate if they become crime magnets? What role do management and owners play in preventing crime in their businesses?
Throughout the United States there are similar older motels that become havens for drugs, murder and gangs. One example is in Jacksonville, Florida, where there is a motel called the Gold Rush Inn which has had so many crimes occurring in it in during the last year, that local residents have marched in protest and have asked for the local government to shut the place down. Protesters say that the motel presents a danger to the area because it attracts crime. There were reportedly 8 homicides in the past 12 months at this particular motel. Consequently local leaders have asked to have the motel be closed down permanently to protect the nearby community.
Question: What do you think? Should motels that become havens for crime be shut down to protect the community?
Mars, the red planet, is the most habitable planet close to earth. For many centuries, humans have dreamed of flying to mars and more recently, of settling on the red planet. In fact, NASA has set the goal of having Americans travel to and settle on mars by the mid-2030's, only about 12-15 years away. The outgoing president Trump was going to make this goal a strong possibility, but now with the new Biden administration, the goal's future is less clear.
The atmospheres of mars versus earth
There are many difficulties to overcome before humans could live on the red planet. First and most importantly, the atmosphere is different than earth, and the main gas we need to survive, oxygen, makes up a much smaller part of the martian atmosphere than on earth, as you can see in the picture above. Furthermore, the soil is not able to be grown in and would have to be modified with fertilizers and other chemicals in order to grow food and produce oxygen. The gravity is weaker than on earth, so settlers would have to exercise a lot to maintain their muscle mass. The sun's radiation is much stronger on mars due to its thinner atmosphere, which means settlers would have to be protected from this as well. Finally the temperature is extremely cold, similar to the antarctic. Despite these very significant difficulties, they could be overcome using our ever-growing technological abilities.
Mars according to Ray Bradbury
I hope that we do colonize mars and bring to life the dream of our Waukeganite writer Ray Bradbury. In his famous book , The Martian Chronicles, Bradbury portrays the first human settlers on the red planet. It is a classic book with excellent stories. Perfect to read over winter break.
Question: would you be willing to travel to mars and settle there?
Congress may approve more direct payments to families this week
More moolah (money) from the government in the form of stimulus checks? You might remember that last Spring many families received about $1,200 per person from the government. In addition, many people who were laid of from their jobs due to the pandemic received and are still receiving unemployment checks. Well, the government must pass another spending bill before Friday evening in order to avoid a shutdown of all of its services. As part of the negotiations to approve a law that would allow the government to continue operating, congress may likely include about $600 in direct payments to eligible individuals. It's not as much as before but every little bit helps!
Question: how has your family held up during the pandemic?
What you need to know about Blackpink according to People Magazine
The K-pop group Blackpink continues to rise in international popularity. People magazine recently ran a full article about the group, and it is unusual for an American magazine to devote so much space to a foreign music group. According to the People Magazine article Blackpink is different from other K-pop groups because:
Between their debut in 2016 and the 2020 release of The Album, Blackpink released fewer than 22 songs, all singles. Despite the small discography, the group's glam look and fun choreography were quickly replicated by other K-pop groups and fans in their social media videos.
The biggest part of Blackpink's popularity lies in their songs, which talk about independence and vulnerability, bilingual lyrics, and undeniable stage presence. Blackpink is also known for the styling of their videos, otherwise referred to as 'concepts' for each song. Where some K-pop videos might have two or three concepts in their music videos, Blackpink will often have five or six completely different concepts (complete with different hair colors and clothing) featured in their video. (Blackpink: What You Need to Know About K-pop's Biggest Girl Group)
Blackpink is currently the biggest girl group in Korea, but there are many other groups as well as the most popular ones at any particular time. Remember the old saying: 'here today, gone tomorrow'.
Question: Do you think the popularity of Blackpink will last?
The historic vaccination program against Covid 19 begins today in Illinois at hospitals in Chicago and in surrounding areas. The beginning of the end of this pandemic is finally here! Last Thursday the FDA approved the Pfizer vaccine allowing the vaccination program to start. The very first people to receive the vaccine are health care workers who are on the front line of caring for people with the virus. Nursing home residents in areas with high infection rates will also receive the vaccine as well. The rest of us will have to wait until our specific group of people, meaning high school students and educators, are in line to get the vaccine. Regardless of when we receive it, vaccination has begun and will continue until we have all received it, likely by the end of the summer. The beginning of the end of the pandemic really is at hand!
Question: will any of your family members be first in line to get the vaccine?
Generally, most people think dinosaurs were not very smart and consequently their brains were not very big. This is largely true. None the less dinosaurs did have functional cognitive abilities that made their survival possible, until the earth changed and became unsuitable for them about 65 million years ago, possibly after a large meteor hit our planet. One of the dinosaurs that lived in what is today Britain which was about as big as a large dog is called Thecodontosaurus. Scientists have reconstructed its brain using computers and have discovered some interesting facts about this long dead animal.
Antonio Ballell, a PhD student at the University of Bristol's School of Earth Sciences, explains some of their findings: "Our analysis showed parts of the brain associated with keeping the head stable and eyes and gaze steady during movement were well-developed. This could also mean Thecodontosaurus could occasionally catch prey, although its tooth morphology suggests plants were the main component of its diet. It's possible it adopted omnivorous habits." (Scientists digitally rebuilt this dinosaur's brain and made some surprising discoveries)
In other words, Thecodontosaurus walked on two legs and sometimes ate meat, along with plants which were its main food source. It also had stable vision when it ran, which helped it to catch prey and escape from larger predators.
Question: what do you think makes dinosaurs so interesting for young people?
On Saturday at McCarran airport in Las Vegas, a pilot on an Alaska Airways flight to Portland, Oregon, noticed a strangly behaving man approach his jet on the runway. The man was Alejandro Carlson, age 41, who was oddly dressed and behaved erratically. The pilot alerted the control tower and security were sent to the aircraft. Meanwhile Carlson climbed onto the jet wing and proceeded to lay down for a while and then stand gazing at the passengers on the jet, engaging in some odd ritual perhaps. People at first thought it was funny and took videos and pictures of the man's behavior. Then, as the police arrived and went through the cabin and out on the wing to take Carlson into custody and remove him from the wing, he took off his shoes and socks and started to climb the winglet, which is the little raised part of the wing at its tip. Unfortunately at that point he slipped and fell right off the wing and hit the ground, just as the police were moving out onto the wing to apprehend him. Carlson was taken to a hospital in Las Vegas and was also arrested. Police suspect he was either mentally ill or impaired by drugs or alcohol. A bizarre but sad incident and hopefully Alejandro Carlson will receive the treatment he needs.
Question: have you ever seen impaired people in Waukegan? What do you think city government and police should do to help them?
Trot continues to get bigger and bigger in South Korea
Song Ga-In, top trot star
K-pop is less popular in South Korea itself than outside of Korea
Despite the continuing international popularity of K-pop idols like BTS and Black Pink, in South Korea itself, the older genre of Trot is growing in popularity among young people. Many K-pop stars begin to sing in this much more 'Asian' style of music after they become older and their popularity among youngeraudiences starts to fade. According to Regina Kim in the Rolling Stone Magazine:
"In South Korea right now, listeners are turning their attention to the oldest form of Korean popular music: “trot,” which derives its name from “foxtrot” and borrows from a wide range of genres, including blues, easy listening, swing, rock and roll and others. Overshadowed by K-pop since the 1990’s and once thought to be on the verge of dying out, Korean trot is currently experiencing a revival thanks to singing competitions like Mister Trot and I Like Trot. " (K-Pop Is Only Half the Story of Korean Pop Music)
If you only listen to the major K-Pop groups, consider expanding your horizons and try some of the most popular music in Korea itself among Koreans both young and old!
Question: what is your favorite style or genre of music?
Song Ga-In, a top Trot singer
This is the most popular Korean Song in the past decade: an 'indie' song by Busker Busker called Cherry Blossom Ending:
Biden and Harris are Time Magazine's People if the Year!
President elect Joe Biden and his running mate and vice president Kamala Harris are named Time Magazine's people of the year. Almost every president has been the Time Magazine person of the year for many many years. However this particular choice is different because it includes the vice president, who is the first Black, Asian and female vice president. In other words, this is a historic choice due to the fact that Biden chose a woman of color for his vice president. On January 20, 2021 at noon Biden and Harris will assume the presidency of the United States.
Question: who would you nominate for the Time Magazine person of the year?
