I’m in my living room, watching a music video on my Wii internet. 'I hope' by the Korean band FT Island. My uncle is sitting in his chair watching his Netflix shows. But since the TV was on, every now and then he would look up, see what I was watching, and then back down to his shows. The video stopped and I went on to the next one; same band, but different song.
After that song is done I see in the ‘related videos’ column ‘Perfection’ by Super Junior M. I happily click on it and the video pops up. My uncle looks up and laughs a little.
“Wow.” He says. “They are so not caught up in time.” He talking about the way the Members are dressed in the video. Dark, skinny looking tuxes; black shinny shoes; some are wearing fur hats, some are wearing leather gloves; similar to a late 80’s look. This makes me a little mad.
“This is only a music video.” I tell him. “They’re wearing what the costume people told them to wear.”
“I know that.” He says. “I’m mostly talking about Korea itself. They’re so back in time that they still thought that Michal Jackson was alive.”

I think different. I think Korea and Japan are in the 21st century like we are. They wear the same cloths as us, the same styles and everything. To prove this, I quickly search for ‘Run Devil Run’ by Girls Generation on the Wii. The Video pops up and 9 girls wearing really short black shorts and black boots start sing their song. I look at my uncle. “They look like they’re in the right time to me.”
“I meant not all the time.” He argues back and goes back to watching his shows. See, my uncle lived in Korea for a year, so he knows more about their culture than I do. But, whenever he talks about how different they are from us Americans, I just get mad. And It’s not just him, It’s almost everyone else in the world too! On Pearl Harbor day I heard. “Today’s not a good day for the Japanese.” And when I talked about my favorite Japanese bands playing in Korea. “Korean people , or at least the elders, don’t like the Japanese because of how they were held captive by them in the war.”
My point being in this story is that I’m sick of it!! I’m sick and tired of people thinking other cultures are different, like they’re a different species. We all have two hands, and two feet, right? We all have two eyes and a nose, right? The only thing different about all of us is our language and culture. So why do we treat the other person like their a Lion at the zoo?
I’m also sick and tired of people hating other people ‘cause of something that happened in the past! So what if Pearl Harbor got bombed by Japanese planes! Guess what! We did the same thing to them! They should hate us as much! Get over it! It’s done! Don’t live in the past!!
I hope that maybe, this story will make you (the reader) think about the different ways we think about each other. Maybe, after you read this, the next time you see a person with single eyelids, black hair, and tan skin or a person with blond hair, blue eyes and a thick German accent, you won’t think of them as an Asian person or a German person; but as just a regular person with a language barrier.
This is all just my opinion. But as I sit here, listening to my favorite Korean songs, even though I don’t know what they are saying, I can hear their emotions through their beautiful voices. Why don’t you listen sometime? Just go onto youtube and search. Pick a song and listen to it. Heck, you might even like it.