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happeningthang
Joined: 26 Apr 2003
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 Posted: Sun Oct 01, 2006 8:33 pm Post subject: |
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Well, no offence intended to the OP who seems to be well intended, but I'm not that appreciative of people telling me how to do my job either.
Imagine you're the K-cop, more than used to dealing with drunks day in day out, and you show up to the scene of:
an agressive drunk ajosshi
a crowd of well meaning locals
a foreign guy telling you that your assessment of said scene is wrong.
I'm going to guess the cops thought that any lack of conciousness was due to alcohol, not an unresonable assumption, and that the guy is aware enough to answer questions - therefore he can make his own way to help. Anyone of the locals can get a phone number from the guy to call friends and family, but everyone assumes, based on the way he's swinging at people, that he wants to be left alone.
It's good of the OP to show concern, but I don't think the nanny state mentality of the west applies in every situation. |
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matthews_world
Joined: 15 Feb 2003
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| Posted: Sun Oct 01, 2006 10:53 pm Post subject: |
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Me and a Korean friend were walking in downtown Daegu last spring in the middle of the day when I guess this drunk or senile older adjosshi somehow started bleeding from his face after he had fallen on the sidewalk.
We just walked on past. Not good, I know but isn't that pretty much what Koreans do when they see crazy people on the street?
Just this morning, there was a guy in downtown Seoul walking along removing manholes along the sidewalk and yelling at someone under it. People just walked on by. |
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ChopChaeJoe
Joined: 05 Mar 2006
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Mon Oct 02, 2006 1:15 pm Post subject: |
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Pretty much, if someone doesn't want my help, then why am I going to continue to offer it?
When the cops showed up, you should have left. |
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princess
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
Location: soul of Asia
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| Posted: Mon Oct 02, 2006 2:57 pm Post subject: |
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| periwinkle wrote: |
| I think it was kind of you to help. I can't figure out what the deal is with the police here, and I really wonder what they do all day. |
Oh, they probably eat those new kimchi donuts and drink soju-flavored coffee...hahaha |
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Novernae
Joined: 02 Mar 2005
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| Posted: Mon Oct 02, 2006 7:17 pm Post subject: |
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| fandeath wrote: |
Hello gotte00,
I had the same experience with my girlfriend. She was drunk and fell down a flight of stairs and lay unconscious. I called the ambulance. When the ambulance came, she was already up. They asked her �Are you ok?�. She said �yes�, but she was still a little dazed� They did a quick check and then they were off. I was not satisfied with their quick check and wanted them to do more.
After this incident, I reflected a lot about the culture difference. I, like you, was frustrated at the lack of attention and care my girlfriend got. Of course, my comparison for what was standard care and attention came what a Canadian emergency worker would do.
I do not claim to have come to any absolute conclusions in my pondering, but I am not so quick to judge Koreans as be negligent in their duties.
I cannot speak for America, or other developed nations, so I will speak from a guy from Canada.
There are several reasons, in my view, why Canada is careful with possible injured people.
1) Healthcare � Going to the hospital for an unnecessary trip will not cost as much as it would in Korea.
2) Lawsuits � I think the main motivation for the extra care is fear of lawsuits, which is almost non-existent in Korea. Even if there were a successful here lawsuit, the payout would be smaller than in a developed country. I am sure that if lawsuits had less power then maybe medical care would suffer, too.
3) The Safety/Risk factor calculation is different. What does this mean? I just created this term, but if someone can explain it better, it would be appreciated. This means Koreans do not focus on safety as much as Canadians. Many Canadians come here and say �that�s dangerous� to so many things and situations in Korea. Although they are right that the activity or situation in Korea is dangerous, as Canadians we are taught/programmed to identify, avoid or prevent that situation more than Koreans are. A Korean will rely on the risk factor more. They will think in terms of odds of danger.
For example, you stated that there was a risk that the guy might choke on his vomit. I tried to do a google search to find out actually how many people die to choking on vomit. I only came across 1 statistic(I didn�t look beyond the first page, feel free to go search deeper)
http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/null/2599
Odds of choking to death on your own vomit: 1 in 740,000 (NSC)
Now a developed nation would focus on the few who die. Because some of those few may be preventable. Plus, if it was proven that one of them could have been prevented then somebody is paying out a lot of money.
The Korean would focus on the odds. There is almost no way that guy is going to be close to choking on his vomit. And they are not willing to waste so many resources to prevent that one death.
There is definitely a culture difference regarding safety. Of course, I support the developed nation method of trying to prevent all injuries even if the odds are low that something would happen. But, we cannot be quick to push our cultural views on Korea. Even the Canadian system is not perfect. Some would say we are over-safe (my Konglish). |
bold is mine
Fandeath, I have to disagree with your interpretation on a few points.
1) Healthcare - I'm not entirely sure, but I would guess that healthcare costs are much less in Korea than in Canada. The cost of an ambulance (to the individual, or maybe their insurance IF they are lucky) in New Brunswick is over $600 (not to mention treatment costs to taxpayers). Also, if your interpretation were true, than there would be no safety conciousness in the US, where healthcare costs are astronomical.
3) You statistical thing. First of all, if that were the case, then your namesake would have no hold in the Korean psyche. I would wager that because drinking and passing out on the street is such a problem, the majority of called emergency services get would be really nothing more then someone who should just spend the night in a drunk tank. I think the ignoring of it probably to do with that, and the unwillingness to recognise it as a problem. People who don't want to admit a problem aren't going to spend much on public education or attempt to curve the 'nonexistent' problem. If it really were about the odds, people would be much more concerned about chocking on their own vomit than fan death, but drunks dying on the street get no press, unlike the half dozen cases of 'fan death' every year. Generally, if we see a person unconcious on the street at home, we know there is a problem because it is not something people accept at home. Here, you'd be hardpressed not to see a dozen unconcious adjosshis on the 6 block walk home and most of them would actually be fine, they just prefered the bench to their bed that night.
It's not that Koreans don't value safety, they just have different ideas of what is and isn't safe, and weird ideas, in my opinion, not that we're perfect (I'm not going for PC relativism here). |
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fandeath
Joined: 01 Nov 2004
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| Posted: Mon Oct 02, 2006 9:19 pm Post subject: |
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| Novernae wrote: |
| fandeath wrote: |
Hello gotte00,
I had the same experience with my girlfriend. She was drunk and fell down a flight of stairs and lay unconscious. I called the ambulance. When the ambulance came, she was already up. They asked her �Are you ok?�. She said �yes�, but she was still a little dazed� They did a quick check and then they were off. I was not satisfied with their quick check and wanted them to do more.
After this incident, I reflected a lot about the culture difference. I, like you, was frustrated at the lack of attention and care my girlfriend got. Of course, my comparison for what was standard care and attention came what a Canadian emergency worker would do.
I do not claim to have come to any absolute conclusions in my pondering, but I am not so quick to judge Koreans as be negligent in their duties.
I cannot speak for America, or other developed nations, so I will speak from a guy from Canada.
There are several reasons, in my view, why Canada is careful with possible injured people.
1) Healthcare � Going to the hospital for an unnecessary trip will not cost as much as it would in Korea.
2) Lawsuits � I think the main motivation for the extra care is fear of lawsuits, which is almost non-existent in Korea. Even if there were a successful here lawsuit, the payout would be smaller than in a developed country. I am sure that if lawsuits had less power then maybe medical care would suffer, too.
3) The Safety/Risk factor calculation is different. What does this mean? I just created this term, but if someone can explain it better, it would be appreciated. This means Koreans do not focus on safety as much as Canadians. Many Canadians come here and say �that�s dangerous� to so many things and situations in Korea. Although they are right that the activity or situation in Korea is dangerous, as Canadians we are taught/programmed to identify, avoid or prevent that situation more than Koreans are. A Korean will rely on the risk factor more. They will think in terms of odds of danger.
For example, you stated that there was a risk that the guy might choke on his vomit. I tried to do a google search to find out actually how many people die to choking on vomit. I only came across 1 statistic(I didn�t look beyond the first page, feel free to go search deeper)
http://tech.yahoo.com/blogs/null/2599
Odds of choking to death on your own vomit: 1 in 740,000 (NSC)
Now a developed nation would focus on the few who die. Because some of those few may be preventable. Plus, if it was proven that one of them could have been prevented then somebody is paying out a lot of money.
The Korean would focus on the odds. There is almost no way that guy is going to be close to choking on his vomit. And they are not willing to waste so many resources to prevent that one death.
There is definitely a culture difference regarding safety. Of course, I support the developed nation method of trying to prevent all injuries even if the odds are low that something would happen. But, we cannot be quick to push our cultural views on Korea. Even the Canadian system is not perfect. Some would say we are over-safe (my Konglish). |
bold is mine
Fandeath, I have to disagree with your interpretation on a few points.
1) Healthcare - I'm not entirely sure, but I would guess that healthcare costs are much less in Korea than in Canada. The cost of an ambulance (to the individual, or maybe their insurance IF they are lucky) in New Brunswick is over $600 (not to mention treatment costs to taxpayers). Also, if your interpretation were true, than there would be no safety conciousness in the US, where healthcare costs are astronomical.
3) You statistical thing. First of all, if that were the case, then your namesake would have no hold in the Korean psyche. I would wager that because drinking and passing out on the street is such a problem, the majority of called emergency services get would be really nothing more then someone who should just spend the night in a drunk tank. I think the ignoring of it probably to do with that, and the unwillingness to recognise it as a problem. People who don't want to admit a problem aren't going to spend much on public education or attempt to curve the 'nonexistent' problem. If it really were about the odds, people would be much more concerned about chocking on their own vomit than fan death, but drunks dying on the street get no press, unlike the half dozen cases of 'fan death' every year. Generally, if we see a person unconcious on the street at home, we know there is a problem because it is not something people accept at home. Here, you'd be hardpressed not to see a dozen unconcious adjosshis on the 6 block walk home and most of them would actually be fine, they just prefered the bench to their bed that night.
It's not that Koreans don't value safety, they just have different ideas of what is and isn't safe, and weird ideas, in my opinion, not that we're perfect (I'm not going for PC relativism here). |
Hello Novernae,
Yes, you are quick to jump on my generalizations. That is the problem with generalizations... that each point made with a generalization is open to attack and clearly arguable.
I made my arguments with generalizations and of course I typed it out in 20 minutes. I know they are flawed.
Thanks for the balance and thank you for having to courtesy not to rudely do it.
I do wonder what would be the cost to a guy in Canada who was forced into an ambulance for treatment he didn�t want.
About fan death�that is more about paranoia. Many Korean believe the odds are high for fan death. A lot would not even risk one night with the fan on believing it is dangerous.
Hmmm� are Westerners paranoid about choking on vomit?
I do think most people do not know the actual odds (including us). Westerners seem to think that choking on vomit is common and Koreans seem to think fan death is common. I would probably guess that Korean worry more about fan death than choking on vomit.
So, yes, they do have a different ideas what is safety and what to be safe about. |
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yospeck
Joined: 29 Aug 2006
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| Posted: Tue Oct 03, 2006 4:21 am Post subject: |
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Best 'Police Service' I've ever seen is when I took a holiday to Sweden to meet up with some Swedish friends (I'm English). At my hosts house warming one of our group got really drunk through the day, to the point he was lying down outside the bowling alley we'd later gone to... just as the police drove past. They put him into the police car and took him to the station to sober up.
Same night, and much drinking later, another one of our group was REALLY drunk. Couldn't walk, couldn't talk, could barely stand straight. Waiting outside my hosts apartment (group got split up) for him to arrive to let us in and put our drunkard to bed, the Police were on routine patrol and drove by us and pulled up. They tried to talk to my friend, and had to talk to my other friends who explained he had drank a lot (all in Swedish so I just stood there looking dumb  ). In the end they just nodded and smiled and told us they were taking our friend to the hospital to put him on a drip and sleep it off for the night
THATS looking after your citizens. He hadn't even had an accident, was just really drunk and was outside the appartment he was going to be sleeping in, but still they thought it better to take him to the hospital just incase.
Thats what having spare beds and a good NHS does for ya  |
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itaewonguy
Joined: 25 Mar 2003
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| Posted: Tue Oct 03, 2006 4:44 pm Post subject: |
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Korean police are uneducted monkeys!!
you think they are the brains at schools?
you think they even went to college?
these are drop out idiots who couldnt get real jobs.. so they had to stay in the military and move onto the police department!
ever see a smiling police offier?
they are pissed off with their life!! they make about 1.5 million a won..
no one respects their status in society, ohh APPA im going to marry a policeman! OVER MY DEAD BODY!! id rather you married a waygook!!
Policemen are little boys who want respect!! I AM POLICE!!!
problem is. no one cares.. so they turn up to a scene and they want their feeling of high and mighty!! pathetic really..
its like cops back home.. with a GUN holstered on.. HUGE IGOES come out
Policemen were kids in schools who got beaten up everyday and had no friends!! |
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bluelake
Joined: 01 Dec 2005
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| Posted: Tue Oct 03, 2006 8:45 pm Post subject: |
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This past spring, I had a police encounter that was a headache, to say the least. Here are three letters I wrote to friends and colleagues at the time:
Letter #1
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On Saturday, I met a friend who came in from Germany. It was the only day we could meet, so he visited Kyongju and we spent the day together.
Towards the end of the afternoon, I had to go pick something up outside of the city, so we drove to the where it was, picked it up, and then we headed back towards Kyongju. However, after our car went through a green traffic light, an old guy (65--looked more like 80) on a motor scooter came at a diagonal from across the street; he had clearly lost control of the bike (he was all over the place) and was coming for us--through quick maneuvering, I got my car a little bit ahead and he just clipped the left rear bumper. Still, he went down to the ground and I believe he bumped his head.
I quickly stopped the car and backed up. My friend and I both got out of the car and ran over to him. He seemed dazed and occasionally squatted down. I asked him (in Korean) how he was. When he seemed rather incoherent (later, I figured out, that was just his natural state), I kept asking him if he would like me to take him to the hospital; he would not answer. When he seemed out of it, I started insisting, and the small group of people who gathered convinced him to go with me to the hospital. He got in and I drove him to Dong Guk University Hospital. Along the way, I kept asking him questions, both to keep his mind alert and also to gauge his cognitive state of mind.
At the hospital, I took him to the emergency room. The person in charge at the registration window told me the matter was not so simple. To begin with, the police had to be notified (I called my wife and she did that). Also, leaving the scene (even for this reason), was technically a mistake. The old guy went into the emergency room ward to be checked out. Later, his nephew showed up, as did my wife.
Little did I know, but the old guy was already changing his story. He started saying I had a red light and he was walking his scooter across the cross walk (BIG lie). My light was green when I was coming up to it; it was green when I went through it, and it was also that way when he drove into me.
A patrolman showed up and we each gave our statements. In front of me, the policeman, my wife, and his nephew, the old guy repeated his lies.
I took the policeman to see my car. I showed him the mark the guy's scooter left on my car (picture attached). If you notice, it goes from a small mark to a larger one--only possible if he hit me at an angle, not running directly into my car; it was one piece of evidence showing he came at an angle and not across the crosswalk.
Although it was now already dark, my wife and the nephew left with the officer to go to the accident scene (strangely--or not--I was not asked to go along). My friend and I went to a restaurant to wait for my wife.
Today, Sunday, my wife had to again meet the other parties (including an officer) at the accident scene; I could not go, as I was in Pohang, and the police allowed that for the initial investigation. One piece of evidence that further disproved the old guy's claim that he was walking across the crosswalk was that there were no marks on the crosswalk, but there were marks a couple meters on the other side, supporting my account; the officer took pictures of it.
One factor working against me is that country villagers tend to be very cohesive--even to the point of lying for one another. That turned out to be the case here, too. When the old guy hit me, there were no witnesses around, except for cars moving in both directions; none of them stopped, that I could see. It wasn't until a few minutes later that three villagers came by. Still, today one villager claimed he saw everything and that the old guy's account was correct; my wife turned on him and said if he insists on perjuring himself, she would include him (or anyone else) in legal action--he quickly said something to the effect of, "Well, I wasn't really that close, so I can't be sure." Unfortunately, my friend had to head to Seoul early today, and he will leave back for Germany this Wednesday, so it's now coming down to "he said/he said".
Tuesday, after my afternoon classes, I have to go into Kyongju, to the police station, to testify on my behalf. So, I would like to ask for your prayers in this matter.
I am thankful that the old guy was not hurt badly (he just had a small bump on his head). If I had been delayed by even a second, he could easily have been in front of my car, and most likely would have been killed. My only thought after the accident was his well-being; I was concerned that he might have a concussion or worse. At that time, I didn't consider the ramifications to myself. However, I now realize that being a Good Samaritan is not always the wisest thing to be (even if what I did was the right thing).
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Letter #2
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As an update, my wife called the police station this morning and talked with the officer in charge of the case. She was pretty upset with him, as he seemed to give deference to the old guy yesterday. When my wife asked him why he didn't question the old guy about his lies, he told her that he had to keep neutral and his being there was only to collect evidence. He said to my wife that he really isn't supposed to say anything yet, but that the evidence shows that the old guy was driving the motorbike, not walking it. He told us not to worry about it, as the evidence is clear.
I had my German friend fax an affidavit to the police chief as to what happened. However, the officer in charge told my wife that the testimony of passengers in the car are inadmissable; and yet, the prevarication of the villagers (some are probably related to the old guy) are admissable.
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Letter #3
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Although the legal aspect was solved some time ago (the police found in my favor), my wife and I felt the police officer involved was biased in favor of elderly country folk (and probably against foreigners and women), and did not fairly look at the evidence. We sent the chief of police a lengthy letter (a novel, really--we explained the situation and also suggested solutions to traffic problems that could not only avoid a repeat of this incident, but also might help save lives), and we finally received a public response from him. He posted his open letter to us on the police dept's bulletin board. In it, he apologized in detail, and also gave thanks for our suggestions. He promised they would look at them in detail and try to implement all they could.
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One thing that I thought I had mentioned in one of the letters, but couldn't find it, was where the policeman listened intently to the villagers, but every time my wife tried to get a word in, he turned on her and yelled, "Shut up!" He was a completely biased so-and-so, with no manners. |
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