Ji Yeon is a magazine editor, surfer and granddaughter of a woman diver. She chose to return from the mainland to Jeju Island after hearing news of the contested second airport which is slated for construction near her native village. Ji Yeon’s passion for activism started as a teenager when she witnessed the environmental decline…
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Jeju Island’s Haenyo: A User’s Manual, the diver who tried to die at sea
The traditional free diver, Ok-sun Lee, was born in the very waters in which she planned to carry out her own drowning some 85 years later. Her life-long friend and fellow diver, Man-bok Kim, seeing the practicality of her choice, aided her in the attempt. The two women survived much together—over seventy years of work at sea, the…
Someone Else’s Americana
See full photo set here
The Traditional Village Shamans of Jeju Island, South Korea: PHOTO ESSAY
The book is out! Order Jeju Island’s Haenyeo, A User’s Manual for kindle and other devices. Interviews with three generations of Jeju Island’s sea women. Ever since Jeju Island forged its way onto the international tourism scene, its women free divers, called haenyeo, have taken center stage as both cultural symbol and tourist attraction. The…
Substantial Victory for Indigenous Villages Opposing 2nd Airport on Jeju Island, South Korea?
Their struggle is perhaps far from over, but the five villages of Seongsan-eup, Jeju Island–South Korea, who have actively opposed a controversial 2nd airport/ airport city/ aerotropolis project, have come to an initial agreement with Jeju Island’s provincial government. The two parties agreed to reevaluate the original feasibility studies done on the proposed area. This means…
Did the women divers of Jeju Island, South Korea discover the Wim Hof breathing method (or something like it) 1500 years ago? UPDATE
If you read my post from last year about my idea that Jeju Island, South Korea’s famed haenyo or women divers have been using some version of the method world record-holder Wim Hof uses to withstand extreme cold, you know that I promised to look into the matter more and do some interviews with…
The Shamanic Spiritual Life of Jeju Island, South Korea’s Traditional Women Free Divers. Short Documentary: The Youngdeung Gods Visit Jeju Island
Every year the Youngdeung Gods visit Jeju Island, South Korea bringing with them strong spring winds. These deities replenish the sea life as they travel their coarse from village to village along the coast. In Hamdeok Village, the shaman Young Cheol Kim presides over the ceremony, a ritualized banquet at which Jeju Island’s famed women divers…
Scherzando Park, South Korean fashion photographer (interview)
Scherzando Park is part of a new generation of Korean photographers and models that are challenging South Korea’s beauty standards. She prefers emphasizing natural aspects of the Asian form, rather than much sought after Western beauty features. Her photography ranges from gorgeous and mature to playful and humorous. Scherzando recently allowed me to use one…
My experimental mash-up novel, The Photograph of Hye Mi Bae is free today on Kindle (Free is over, but the book is still available)
And now for something different, very, very different: I’ve written an experimental novel, a mash-up actually, something like Jane Slayre–or Pride and Prejudice and Zombies or Warlock Holmes. The Photograph of Hye Mi Bae is a mash-up of Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray and a story I’ve concocted myself about a Korean photographer…
Pagans We Are does TEDx (video inside)
This past November, I gave a TEDx talk on Jeju Island, where I’ve been documenting shamanic shrine culture for the past five years, as you well know if you follow my blog. I talk about my video and photography work and the importance of preserving sacred spaces, many of which are in danger on…
Jeju Island’s Haenyo: A User’s Manual, bil-le, bil-le, beach of death
“Back then, many people had been killed by the national government’s forces,” the woman informed me. “Many of the bodies from neighboring villages washed up on Pyeol-ro-Neo-man-ri’s shore. The bille was strewn with bodies. The women of our village were offered a deal. If they cleaned up the corpses, then they’d have the rights to the neighboring village’s territory.”
And clean up the bodies they did. The women of Pyeol-ro-Neo-man-ri, many in their twenties and thirties at the time, some much younger, scoured the jagged bille, combing over each and every surface for the remains of the neighboring village’s dead.
Jeju Island’s Haenyo: A User’s Manual, the diver who heard music underwater
Jeju Island’s Haenyeo, A User’s Manual will be released as an e-book this July on Amazon. Pre-orders help sales rankings. If you enjoy the series, pre-order the book and receive it on July 14th. (Description on the book’s amazon page) I had a beautiful experience once, one night drinking wine on a coastal boardwalk, in…
