This was a story from the Mainichi Daily News. I knew that is still a lot of animosity that the Koreans hold toward the Japanese for the way they have been dealt with in the past... Unfortunately, the Japanese have never done anything to really resolve the old issues between them, but have swept them under a rug and ignored them. (The Japanese became 'peace-fanatics' after WW2, and seem to feel that suffering an atomic bomb absolved them of all their many offenses in WW2.)
So the Koreans have been festering all these years because of lack of closure it seems (as well as the superior attitude that Japanese generally have toward other Asians), and their kids sound like they are being groomed for hatred/revenge.
If the Japanese want peace with their neighbors, they will have to address the Koreans' grievances with humility. Maybe give up their claim to the island, in an act of peace. I hope the Koreans will have a change of heart, too... and stop brainwashing their kids--like the N Koreans!
bebu
http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/waiwai/news/20050709p2g00m0dm001000c.html
Korean kids bash Japan with crayons in Seoul subway art exhibit
Teacher: "All right class, everybody got their box of crayons? For our lesson today, we're going to draw some nice pictures."
Kids' chorus: "Yaaaaay!"
Teacher: "I want you to draw me something about those terrible Japanese: Like their weirdo prime minister with his funny hairdo; their false territorial claims to our wonderful island of Tokdo -- which they have the nerve to call Takeshima -- or anything else you can come up with. Let your imaginations run wild, but give me a drawing to show how we Koreans treat them with fierce contempt!"
The above remarks are entirely hypothetical. But we can surmise from the children's artistic output that their teacher must have given a pretty good pep talk to motivate kids to draw such unflattering sketches depicting Japan. How do we know this? Because several dozen such pictures were used last month to decorate the walls of a subway station in a suburb of Seoul.
They were subsequently photographed by a reporter of the Jiji News Service, and from there they went to a two-page spread in Flash (July 12).
It seems that children's sketches are a regular feature in Seoul subway stations. Sometimes kids are encouraged to make pictures urging adults to be careful of fires; or, they might draw pictures of their life at home; or pictures about the kinds of jobs they want to do when they grow up. But at the start of June, reports Flash, the pictures appearing in the station adopted the theme of "Ban-Il" (anti-Japan).
A Canadian living in the city of Buchon, who raised the issue in the media, tells Flash, "Right after I arrived in Korea a newspaper for middle school students ran the question, 'If you could be president just for one day, what would you do?' and one student replied, 'I would fire all the missiles in our arsenal at Japan, and then tell them they were launched by accident.'
"Why do Koreans hate Japan so much? I can't understand it."
"South Korea has a militant, highly powerful teachers' union," explains Professor Riki Nishioka of Tokyo Christian University. "They put a priority on ideology and lean toward friendly relations with North Korea, while taking an anti-American, anti-Japanese stance. Some of those teachers have even assigned students to write letters to President Bush, asking him to refrain from attacking North Korea. This time they had the kids draw posters."
What kind of posters? Flash shows seven. All in black and white, although color versions have been appearing in Internet blogs. The children's names have been airbrushed over. One has the Japanese female manga character Sailor Moon, waving a Korean flag and proclaiming "Tokdo is Korean!" Another illustrates a soft turd, floating on the ocean, and labeled "the Japanese homeland." Still another shows the Japanese Hinomaru flag, funereally rimmed with black bunting. Baektosan, North Korea's highest peak, is shown erupting, spouting lava and fumes on Japan. And yet another shows a dog whose face bears a striking resemblance to PM Koizumi, chained to a doghouse, where it is about to be beaten by a man, no doubt Korean, holding a club. Even more violent is a Korean stick figure, wearing a Rambo-style headband, firing his machinegun across the ocean into a Japanese who staggers and spouts blood.
"In any case, this underscores Korea's ignorance and illusions," remarks professor Masao Shimojo of Takushoku University. "Japan, on the other hand, never asserts itself at all, preferring the principle of peace at any price.In other words, South Korea's anti-Japanese attitude is being propagated by Japan itself."
One pays a high price for engaging in gutless diplomacy, Flash sighs. (By Masuo Kamiyama)