04.03.07
Hwangsa
Usually, I’m not one to use a lot of non-English words for an audience that doesn’t speak the language in question, but in this case, I’m making an exception. Why? Because “yellow sand dust storms that last for weeks but fluctuate in intensity” is just too much of a pain to write out. And besides that, it still doesn’t do a very exact job of describing the phenomenon. Anyway, the “hwangsa,” as the Koreans call it, is a big deal in the springtime here. Everybody talks about it. Everyone dreads it. Everybody has a story about it. Oh, and it can bring various maladies and possibly even polish your teeth for you if you dare to be outside smiling when it’s thick (and you don’t mind a mouthful of grit for a day or two afterwards). This week, it got bad. Even the military says so. And they say it’ll happen again. No aerobic activity out-of-doors for a while, I guess. Not that I’m complaining all that much…
