Monday, March 27, 2017

A Different Kind of Hooligan

I had been wondering what to use as the central theme of this blog. I had toyed with the idea of praising one of my favorite places on God's green earth, Jamsil Stadium. With the old girl being scheduled for demolition in the coming years, it would be fitting to talk about just how much that stadium means to me but that's something for later in the year.

I haven't entirely wasted your time with that first paragraph as I will be talking about the stadium somewhat but I will focus on what I think might ruin it's legacy. Korean sports hooligans.

Back home a hooligan is likely to be a middle aged man with a shaved head, plenty of tattoos and a beer gut. They tend to do it because they are stupid and often drunk. Many of them are just primates that just enjoy fighting. They don't actually have anything personal against anyone. They just get off on smashing up places and smashing in faces.


So, what does a Korean hooligan look like or act like. Well... not like that. You would now expect me to talk about Ajussis or older Korean men tanked up on soju but I am actually going to talk about their polar opposites. I am going to talk about creatures that look nothing like those skin-headed apses pictured above. I am going to talk about young, self-entitled, fashionable Korean females. Usually between the ages of 20 and 32. Usually caked in make up and manicured to perfection. So, what has led to me branding some of these people as hooligans. Well lets start where you would expect... Jokbal! Yess... back to pig feet!!!

Those of you that have followed my various social media streams and especially those of you who have read this blog before, will know that we have our jersey for jokbal campaign on the go. We are offering players delicious pig meet in exchange for a game worn sweaty jersey. So we took our campaign to the next level. We decided to camp outside of the stadium entrance from 8am with our banners and we would do a trade with any players that fancied a bit of pork. Sadly, riddled with cold, I arrived too late to catch any meaningful players and George had lost his sign in his hotel parking lot. So we failed on that front but that is where the hooliganism began to be apparent.

Let's make it clear, our campaign is good hearted. We will not specifically harass any players. We will not get into anybodies personal space and we will respect everybody. We will not push hard. We will just show our signs and sing our songs about jokbal. However, these Korean female hooligans are different. They terrorize the players. They go beyond what is reasonable or decent. They bother the players when they are with their families. They block the entrances to their homes. They stop them getting in and out of their cars. They block doors. They push and they shove! Last year, Oh Jae Won of Doosan Bears crashed his car because of these hooligans. Apparently, this stuff happens every day of the year. These people are unreasonable. They don't get basic rules of decency. Their behavior gets worse once inside the stadium.

So come 11am. We headed into the stadium. To our joy, there was a jokbal provider. A good one. Our new official provider should a player take us up on our offer.


We posed for our picture with their stand and then headed to our seats. Our view wasn't great but with freedom to move and the always friendly staff employed by Doosan coupled with cheap beer and good company would ensure a good time. Until more Korean hooligans arrived!



These hooligans usually have all of the team clothes. In fact they spend hundreds of dollars on every last item that is available. However, they don't really cheer. They just sit and complain. They judge those that cheer. They make very racist comments in Korean. They sit and take selfies. They do their make up. They try to stop anybody standing up cheering. They think that all foreigners are dumb, fat and dirty. They will take your seats and refuse to move. One such hooligan refused to leave because her seat was next to a child. Another wanted a seat for her handbag. As I said, their behavior is unreasonable. They will also push their own grandmother down the stairs to get a home run or foul ball.

Whenever I hear them moaning and spouting their racist bullshit, I tend to become a loud and obnoxious Trump fan. I tend to find that they become uncomfortable with that. I usually cheer louder and stand my ground. So do my friends. Oh... and we eat our jokbal.



I am not joking when I tell you how much support we get from the other Korean fans. I have been overwhelmed with photo requests. Most people see our campaign for what it is; fun! We have already met so many great people after just 2 weeks of the campaign. But with ticket price increases, the LG stunt and the huge amount of Doosan memberships, I feel that a lot of these good people will be forced out of going to games. I feel that guys who have supported teams for 20 years will be gone. You know that they aren't factored into the business plans of the respective new stadiums for either Doosan or LG. We know that those teams will keep increasing prices to ensure that only these young female hooligans who are willing to spend their parents' hard earned money on the team crap such as plastic jackets will be the ones remaining. By the time the teams have put off all of the regular, loyal punters, these hooligans will have moved onto something else trendy and the stadiums will be empty.

So I love Jamsil stadium, but I am really worried that its' last years could be spend dealing with these hooligans and maybe without the people that helped make it a real hallowed ground of world sport.

We didn't get a jersey again. But a couple of players seemed to be really interested. Judging by the media attention and fan reaction, the campaign is going well. It is achieving its' real aim: Make Baseball Fun Again!!! Let's hope that we don't get shutdown by these attention grabbing hooligans!












Monday, March 20, 2017

An Important Campaign Begins

So I started the blog with a bit of an introduction that basically made it clear that there would be little if any talk of sports on this sporting blog. That is a promise that I will gladly keep as I talk public transport, Nazis, wigs, taco bell and most importantly... PIG FEET.

So let's get on with the main issue at hand. Jokbal. If you don't know what it is, it is a delicious boiled pig's foot dish eaten in Korea. It seems to have enough fat to have caused all of Dick Cheney's heart problems on one plate. So what does this have to do with baseball or anything for that matter? Well the Korean Baseball League has several larger guys who look like they may be partial to a plate or two of this festival of cholesterol. We too, also like to partake. So we have (drunkenly) developed our own stories about Korean players sitting down together and stuffing their faces with the stuff until a cardiologist and a defibrillator are required. I'm sure that you are still confused by all this talk of pig feet. So, I'll get to the point. Inspired by World Class soccer player Sergio Ramos accepting a plate of pork in exchange for his Real Madrid jersey, we decided to see if we could trade Jokbal for a Korean baseball jersey. A campaign was born!!!

So George and I started this important crusade. A little last minute, mind. In fact, I could only use what could be found in Daiso (a Japanese $1 store in Korea that sells Chinese crap that breaks easily) come closing time on the night before the game. So, I spent Friday night alone with some whiteboard markers and a $3 table cloth. I think that the result wasn't all that bad given 1. the materials 2. the time spent and 3. The drink consumed. It got the point across anyway. Jokbal will be exchanged for a player jersey!


So armed to start our campaign, we headed to the Geocheok Sky Dome in positive spirits. We even stocked up on Taco Bell for our pre game party. Optimism was brimming.

As usual the mood changes when you get to Sindorim station. The dome is in a horrific location. From my home, which is pretty much in Seoul, it would be faster to go to see a game in Gwangju than get to the damn Dome. For some odd reason they built it on the worst subway line that runs infrequently and goes to some small village more than it goes to Incheon which is a city of around 4million people. I hear that Nexen, the team that plays there, don't actually want to be there but some corrupt public official(s) are forcing their hand. Seriously, the trip is annoying enough with that extra 20minute wait near the stadium to transfer to travel just one more station, you arrive with stress and anger levels close to those who go on killing rampages. No logic would have resulted in the construction of this place, especially, not where it is. Some official needs to be shot or at least be sentenced to hard labor!

So we finally try to go into the dome. Calmed down from our long journey, we are ready to enjoy some sport. But then a Nexen Nazi stops us. It turns out that our friend Justin can't enter because he has a baseball bat... given to him by a player who was in the game! There was to be more fascism to come!


So we finally got into the dome, and took our over priced seats with abysmal sight lines. But hey! Game time! Jokbal time!


We tried mounting our banners. Achtung! Nein!!! Screamed the little Kim Jong Un (he is actually a pretty good lookalike). Anyway, we thought we could just cheer as we always do and have a good time. It seemed like all would be well. The Nexen team lined up for the national anthem, looking at Jokbal signs and struggling keep straight faces. We got waves from Doosan stars, smiles from Nexen players and even a nod from the umpire. We were filmed for the live TV broadcast, asked to pose for tons of pictures and idolized by children (a fair few adults too). The campaign was going well. So it looked like we might finally have a good time. Nope! Not at Nexen! Another Kim Jong Un impersonator ran over telling us to be quiet. Telling us to not show our signs in any way!

Disheartened, we quietened down for a while. But the rows of people behind us started cheering and shouting "Jokbal!!!" We got the show going again.

Unfortunately, our first day on the campaign didn't result in a jersey. But there were plenty of encouraging signs. But there will be no more trips to the dome. That place needs to be consigned to a dark place in hell along with the people who designed it and the people who run it.

So we gave our first stadium review. We have been told to tell you that the dome has made some minor improvements such better visibility due to new nets and new big screens. They are improvements but they basically improve the dome from being like having an incurable degenerative disease such as MS to being more like having a cancer that is curable. Don't go there. Everything is expensive, the staff are rude and the views are terrible and the transport is useless. This is without pointing out just how inadequate the facilities are or how woeful the food is in the dome. Marcus had the pleasure of waiting over 3 innings for a yellow lettuce sandwich which was advertised as a burger.

So, George and I have been lucky to gain a decent amount of TV coverage recently. George's green wig is probably the main cause. I'd like to explain this now but I think that I have ranted on long enough. All will be explained in our basketball post season blog and review! Anything that helps get us a jersey is enough right now!

So failure but plenty of optimism for when we go to a stadium that is run by South Koreans instead of North Korean Nexen.

So this weekend, the Jokbal campaign will go to Jamsil for a special edition. We will have our full season preview and a stadium tour that will be radically different. We actually quite like the old girl. We are hoping to have a couple of special guests in the broadcast too!

Thursday, March 16, 2017

Let's get something straight... An introduction

So let's get something straight. I want to be very clear. The #kbokojengi blog will not be a blog about baseball. It will not contain that much information about what actually happens in any sport. This is kind of to sport what Top Gear has been to cars. It will use sporting events as an opportunity to have an adventure. I will tell you about the mishaps that have happened on the way to games, I will tell you about stadiums that have been designed by the visually impaired and I will probably get drunk in many different ways with many people. I will report on the amazing people that can be met around and on the way to stadia. I will entertain with new colorful characters and I will try to bring glorious exotic packed lunches.

The blog won't be without advice. We will be reviewing stadia, suggesting where to go and how to get there. Also, you will find out places to avoid in stadia and in cities. You will hear negative reviews but honest and unbiased praise when credit is due.

All opinions on the actual sport will be honest but not serious. If you want real analysis, there are plenty of fountains of knowledge out there. You will only see statistics in special circumstances, there are better sources for those things too.

So I hope that makes things clear. So it is time for our first adventure, a preseason jaunt to see Nexen v Doosan at the Geocheok Sky Dome. One of the newest and most expensive venues in world baseball. A host stadium of the 2017 WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC. Should be impressive, right? Well even if it isn't, Vodka and Taco Bell should make it an interesting experience! Follow @kbokojengi to find out!