Hot July

My July is very hot like weather of California. I wrote many articles than most, especially I tried to write the long story that was related to investigating report, it is one of my goals. I had to gather more information and analyze more deeply for writing the long story. It is the same way to write investigating report.

Especially I spent this week to be worthwhile. My story is printed on the first page. Of course my colleague, Alexa Hyland, helped me a lot. If she didn’t help me, I couldn’t make a good deal.

We tried to write about economic condition of Koreatown, It is reeling from a triple bogey of economic slowdown, rising exchange rates, and the swine flu. In addition to the fall in real estate prices from the economic slowdown in the United States, sales are down at restaurants and other shops Korean-Americans are commonly known to operate. On top of this, vacancies are rife at such short-term accommodations as hotels as business trips from Korea dwindle. When it rains it pours, and adding to the clouds are concerns over the swine flue, which are causing cancellations from group tours.

At first she couldn’t understand why lots of Korean worried about swine flu. I usually wondered why American didn’t be concerned about swine flu. Korean media still reported about swine flu and Special Countermeasures Headquarter was working. But swine flu was not an issue any more in here. I had thought strange thing was not Korean media but American media.

I think swine flu is similar to nuclear weapon of North Korea. South Korean dosen’t worry about North Korea much. They feared second Korean War 5 years ago. But now only a few people do that.

Perhaps terrorism is the same thing. Middle East Asian don’t worry about the terror. But the only people who live in Non Middle East fear that. I’m not sure.

To begin with we collect the information, reservation of hotels and airlines. And the we interviewed various worker who work for tour companies or restaurant. But we met the unthougtht-of difficulties. It was very difficult to find out reasonable statistics though most of them we met said their revenue declined about 20% compared to before year. The number is very important to Economic newspaper. It used to verify and backup the fact.

Especially Charlie, my chief editor, asked to find the reliable number. After several trial, I found the number of Korean visitors in Korean Tourism Organization. KTO gathered information from ITA(International Trade Administration) in U.S. Until April in this year, the number of Korean visitors is 207,895, it declined 17.3% from the same time last year. Don’t give up, you can find. The information we try to find must be, but we don’t know where.

I never forget the memories of the Poynter. Bill and Paul got rid of my fear about coaching and then I could realize what I share with my colleagues. So I could prepare more perfectly next 2 months.

And I'm falling in love to making photo slides. Unfortunately my slides dose not work in this page. Check it out my fouth work!

How Does Your Kid Stack Up?

KoreaTown clinics offer test to gauge future height of children

by Myoung Hoon Suh

It’s the latest fad to hit the states from South Korea and it has nothing to do with tart frozen yogurt. But it has been good business for KoreanTown’s medical clinics.

It’s a test that predicts how tall children are likely to grow. With the average Korean male standing 5 feet, 8 inches – more than an inch shorter than average American – more Korean parents are having their children’s bone growth tested.

“Concerned that their children might end up getting bullied by bigger children, many Korean parents are particularly keen to know how tall their children are going to be,” said Hyungsuk Choi, chief of the medical staff at Samra Acupuncture Spinal Center on West Olympic Boulevard, where about 300 children have been tested and around 100 are now assessed monthly.

The test has been popular for 10 years in Korea and is offered by Western pediatricians when stunted growth is suspected. It involves X-raying a child’s hand to examine growth plates – the area at the end of bones at the joints where growth occurs.

Western doctors will prescribe hormones to children when stunted growth is diagnosed. But Samra, given that most of the children tested are found to be normal, the foucus is on better diet – if needed – to boost a shorter child’s height.

Justin Park took his 11 year-old son to be tested because he was one of the shortest boys in his class. But the growth plate test showed that the child was just fine and should grow substantially taller.

“He avoided playing basketball and playing outside,” sand Park, whose remarks were translated from Korean. “After the test he became more outgoing because he had the confidence he could be tall”

Neo Experiences

I had a lot of new experiences in the last two weeks. I wrote about ‘growth plate test’. To put it simply, growth plate is found between the joints and is the places where the bones grow. The test is attracting considerable interest not only because they can predict how tall a child is going to be, but because they even read the general health condition of a child. It has been ten years since many hospitals in Korea have been giving test.

Most of the children taking the tests are between the ages of 10-13. The test starts by extrapolating the height of the child by drawing references to the parents. Many scientific models already exist to forecast a child’s height.

X-ray observations of the hand then examine the state of growth sprouts in the joints. The hand has more than 20 spots of growth sprouts and makes it possible for the most accurate assessments.

I hoped to write about non-finance sector because I’m lack of experiences expect for finance sector. And Korean reporters had to change their beat about once two years. So if I returned my home, I'm also not an exception. It’s related my training plan.

Also I thought over ‘Investigate report’ and how important is the background knowledge. I took part in our special edition with my mentors. We focused on the banks how to be affected by real estate recession. Because in recent years California is one of the most property booming.

At first we gathered information about banks located in California states though FDIC and FRB. We checked all, there are 50 banks, one by one. This work is not easy. Because the accounting terms on financial statements didn’t unify.

So we recalculated a lot of things. Some banks used ‘Real Estate Loan’ but the others used ‘Commercial and Industrial Loans’. Our special edition that had 6 page articles and 4 page charts was born finally.