Did Those Who Welcomed The First Sunrise of 2011 Leave their Rubbish On The Beach?

Seeing a photo of the piles of rubbish left behind by exuberant but thoughtless or apathetic people who were out on the streets of my hometown left me wondering:  Did  the Koreans who welcomed the first sunrise of 2011 leave their paper cups of coffee, plastic bottles or party hats all over the beach or did most do the responsible thing and dispose of their rubbish properly?

I'd like to think that if you're going to celebrate the new year by communing with nature, you're more likely to take care of the environment and not leave your mess to be cleaned up by foreign labourers. But then that may be naive of me. If only we took more seriously more concrete yardsticks to measure how advanced a society is - instead of looking at the GDP, how about seeing how much or little waste is left behind by party-goers?

If any of you were there on the beaches and hilltops in Korea before dawn, could you share with me what you saw on the ground when it was lit up by the first rays of the sun?


sources:
http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2011/01/01/2011010100325.html
http://kl-nite.blogspot.com/2010/01/2010-new-year-celebration-area-kl.html

Munsu's Suicide To Protest Against The Four-River Project

The last time I heard of a Buddhist practising self-immolation to protest against something was actually the first modern or at least the most-publicised suicide by fire committed by a Vietnamese monk protesting against the regime of Ngo Dinh Diem on 11 June, 1963. Now Venerable Munsu who died on Monday, 31st May, joins a list of those who have chosen to fight various causes, political or non-political, by setting themselves aflame. Ven. Munsu ( and here I hesitate to use a pronoun because one website identifies Munsu as female while others assume the opposite) may well be the third South Korean in modern times to do this after Jeon Tae-il in 1970 who was protesting against unfair labour laws and Heo Se-uk, more recently in 2007, who was against the Free Trade Agreement signed between South Korea and the USA.

My feelings of dismay and revulsion are mixed with curiosity. What drives a person to do such things? How would the President respond to the suicide note which apparently reads: “The Lee Myung-bak administration must stop its four rivers restoration project immediately, eradicate corruption and do its best for poor and underprivileged people instead of the rich”? What will be the long-term impact, if any, of her/his suicide?

I have typed the word "sacrifice" but have backtracked and deleted it in this text because I'm not sure if using that word connotes something positive that would glamourise self-immolation,even though some Buddhists may have a different perspective on the value of life. In a society which already has a high suicide rate, one more death is one too many, even though it's not motivated by financial woes or personal despair. Today, reading the news about Ven. Munsu, I feel diminished.

 Lee Myung-bak, a.k.a. The Bulldozer, forges ahead, deaf to the calls of the self-immolating nun/ priest to stop the Four Rivers Restoration Project.

 Rest in Peace, Ven. Munsu. I hope your death is not in vain.

sources:
http://www.ucanews.com/2010/06/01/buddhist-monk-burns-to-death-in-river-protest/
http://koreawetlands.blogspot.com/
http://world.kbs.co.kr/english/news/news_Dm_detail.htm?No=73015&id=Dm
http://joongangdaily.joins.com/article/view.asp?aid=2921282
http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_entertainment/423695.html
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2010/06/117_66840.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_self-immolations