Mr. & Mrs. Vandebilt + kids

Sadly, one of the things we will remember most about being in Korea is the swine flu panic. Korean media has done an exceptional job of propagating fear among everyone about this little bug. They are one of the countries with the fewest deaths, especially when you consider how many people live here, but they treat it like everyone is about to catch the flu.

Vaccinations have started this month in the schools and now the majority of students have been vaccinated. That still hasn’t stopped the growing fashion trend of masks. At least 30% of the students (and many adults as well) wear masks ranging from the cheap disposable version to cloth ones with cartoon faces on them. They are very proud of these masks.

I’m not usually one to panic about these kinds of things. I definitely think its serious and I wouldn’t be too impressed if I got it, but I’m not about to hole up in the apartment to avoid this plague. The Korean propaganda has even started to frighten us foreigners.  Apparently 1 or 2 of the students at Brynn’s academy has had the “shinjong flu” which has led even the director to start wearing a mask at school.

It probably doesn’t help matters that half of the students are sick, but since the parents refuse to keep their kids home from school you just have to sit in a small room with 10 coughing children. Also on the list of missing manners in Korea is covering one’s mouth when coughing or sneezing.

While I’m pretty sure I’m not going to catch this bug, we’ve still taken to using hand sanitizer after every activity that involves touching anything.  Hopefully that will keep us safe from the flu.  The Koreans take greater precautions around us anyway.  It is not unusual to have people cover their nose and mouth as they cross our path.  I think it’s pretty silly as it means they just spread whatever was on their own hands to their face… but at least whatever germs they had are shielded from me.  Part of the Korean propaganda machine is that the flu is not Korean – it’s a foreigner flu.  Therefore foreigners will spread the flu… right?

I can certainly sympathize with this little pig in the video clip.  He didn’t start the swine flu, neither did I.