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The Dawn of Modern Korea

By a-n-lankov

The Dawn of Modern Korea Books

The Dawn of Modern Korea

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Description
A General Upheaval in the Land of the Morning Calm - The most intriguing tidbits about modern Korea When in 1897 the first modern Korean bank issued its first loan, the loan had to be secured against the only property the borrower had in his disposal, his donkey. The loan was repaid at time, but for few days bank managers had to take care of the animal. In the 1930s the Western restaurants were almost absent in Seoul, so if somebody wanted to eat a decent Western-style meal, the only solution would be to go to a Seoul station restaurant, The Grill. More or less all Korean industrialists or politicians, including all president of the 1948-1980 period, visited the place a number of times. When in the 1920s the taxi service began to spread in Korea, most cabs had no meters, so the fixed rate was introduced. It would cost one won to travel to any location within the city limits. In those days this roughly equaled daily earnings of an unskilled laborer. In the 1890s, some mountain pass near Seoul were considered dangerous because of frequent tiger attacks. In 1915 alone, hunters killed 11 tigers nationwide. The last tiger in South Korea was killed as recently as 1921 in Northern Kyongsang, and the last confirmed sighting occurred in 1946. In 1955 a small workshop bearing the proud name of the International Car Company began to manually assemble US Jeeps. Thus inauspiciously began the history of the Korean automobile industry, now one of the world's largest. In the 1960s the Korean government believed that excessive growth of population would undermine the economic growth. So, they waged one of the world's most successful family planning campaigns. In the 1990s, it was the low fertility rate and population aging which came to be seen as major demographic problems in Korea. These and many other facts about changes of the Korean life over the last 150 years can be found in the new book by Andrei Lankov, titled Dawn of Modern Korea.
Product details
Binding:
Paperback
Publication Date:
2007
Publisher:
EunHaeng NaMu
Languages:
Published: English
ISBN10:
895660214X
Weight:
522 g
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