Breaking Barriers: South Korea's Thriving Journey Amidst Ideological Struggles
- brandonjbk
- Aug 12, 2023
- 3 min read
Updated: Sep 2, 2023
After I had returned from my study abroad and travel throughout Europe, I had returned to the United States to finish out my first career, which was centered around the performing arts. I had graduated from Joanne Baron / D.W. Brown Studio with a performance art focus to add to my undergraduate degree in business from the UW - Madison. I made it to TV and some small film but was winding down and ready to move on to something different. I didn't know exactly what I wanted to do next, but I knew enough to focus on getting my MBA. Interestingly enough, it was hard to get into Bschool. I hadn't followed the traditional path of working at a bank or at a consumer product goods company. But I discovered a terrific international business school located in Phoenix AZ known as Thunderbird, The Graduate School of International Business. A perfect fit for business and my travel passion, and they had accepted a different kind of student!
I could go on and on about how great Thunderbird is. They are now located in downtown Phoenix, affiliated with Arizona State University. But this article is about a country still split along ideological lines. And that's Korea. After the first semester, they offer what are called "winterims". Essentially, these are study abroad opportunities and my first was to South Korea, China, and India. We were focusing on what would become the challenges of today. A growing China and India and South Korea and a breakup of the western hegemony.
Now, there are a ton of beautiful sites to visit while in Seoul. I was there essentially to study the geopolitical history and where things were headed from an economic standpoint. Essentially, how is it that the south has fully accelerated passed the north and yet the peninsula continues to be divided to this day. Also, I was there in the winter, which is incredibly cold! We stayed down near the university and had sessions at the U.S. Embassy. Several officials provided us an overview of the U.S. relationship with South Korea. One thing that stood out was just how large the U.S. Embassy was right in central Seoul. I had mixed feelings about it, wonder what it would be like if there was another country's embassy building right smack in the middle of downtown Manhattan? But also, where would South Korea be without the U.S. partnership? I was pleased that my mindset was growing well beyond the young kid from small town Midwest of Wisconsin.
These images are not ones that I took myself. There were rising tensions between the north and south during the early 2000s (although it seems to happen each year unfortunately). During our visit to the DMZ, we were not allowed to take photos. However, I found these that represent my experience. It is probably one of the top 5 most profound experiences I've had oversees. Just the site of the Han River. We had a chance to go down into the tunnels that were being built by the North between the 60s-80s and were discovered in the mid 70s through bubbles coming up to the surface of the Han given the dynamite going off underground. Can you believe that? We had a chance to ride underground and go right up to a fortified cement wall that divided the two countries. I kept thinking to myself what it would be like to be in a country that was on opposite sides of one another politically and the daily threat of a possible invasion? The propaganda village, Kijong-dong, can be seen from the DMZ, it's on the North Korean side. My understanding is that it's a town built to display progress and a means to encourage the South Koreans to defect. I left the DMZ with more questions than answers. But I was more educated than before, and hope that the two sides would come together somehow during my lifetime....
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