Ben: Pick the Daejeon King Day

It's time for local elections in Korea, or "Pick the Daejeon King Day" as my students told me it was called while lobbying hard for Ewha to close down for election day. Elections in Korea are a little different than elections in America. For one less than a month ago we had no idea they were even on their way. Then suddenly streets and buildings were covered with massive banners.

This poster is for Candidate Number 2! His color scheme is lime green and red! Each candidate has their own number and color scheme, which is good because otherwise they all look like the exact same slightly chubby, middle aged Korean male.

Here is part of a rally for Candidate1. His theme appears to be blue and red. The stand that the man in the center is speaking from (right next to the giant TV screen) is actually the back of a truck. These trucks have been driving around blaring music, speeches, and other general nonsense for the past couple of weeks.

Here's the same truck from another angle. I'm not sure if they have to buy those uniforms, or the campaign issues it to them, or if they're actually provided by the government for each candidate to use. There are all identical though. I especially like the row of people just standing stiffly in front of the truck. It almost looks as is they are there to be the muscle protecting the speaker on the truck, just in case Candidate 2's goons stop by to disrupt the rally.

Here is one final picture of Candidate 1's truck. This day his man was doing a speech for him, but last week it was just loud, Lord of the Ringish music accompanying a video of the Candidate walking around, giving talks, serving in the army, and other really not so epic things.

If you want to get a sense of the volume (and the awesome music that is played) you should stop by http://www.eatyourkimchi.com/ and watch the video they did of their local election.