With retirement weighing heavily on her mind, Kim Chung-ja, a mezzo-soprano and music professor of Korea National University of Arts, took a sabbatical from work in 2005. She spent a few months traveling Europe, then a couple of months more in the U.S., but still had no clue as to what her post-retirement life would be like, despite reaching 60. Then a short trip to Africa changed it all. “I believe it was God’s calling,” she said in an interview in Seoul last month, describing a series of event

Vibrant food trucks are popping up in neighborhoods around the globe, serving up cleverly prepared and succulent on-the-go grub. Whether it is Korean fusion kimchi tacos, finger lickin’ good barbecue or one-of-a-kind gourmet sandwiches, food trucks have been slowly taking over the streets of major cities across the U.S. and other parts of the world. Some are even calling the States ― where the evolution of food vendors seems to be the most profound ― the “food truck nation.” With a no-limits att

Daniel Tudor, journalist and bar owner, set to start new venture in Internet media

ExhibitionsLinda McCartney Retrospective: Daelim Museum in Seoul is holding a retrospective on photographer Linda McCartney until April 26, 2015. The first retrospective here of the celebrated photographer shows McCartney’s earlier works, including portraits of popular musicians such as Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix, family photos depicting her happy life with Paul McCartney and their children, and later works that capture the beauty of daily life and nature. Admission is 5,000 won for adults. T

South Korea will apply for World Heritage Status for an ancient defensive wall encircling its capital city in 2016, a government committee said Thursday.The Seoul City Walls, an 18.6-km-long wall surrounding Hanyang, the former capital of the Joseon era (1392-1910) and present-day central Seoul, was chosen during a meeting on Tuesday to be, along with other heritage items, on South Korea’s application for the UNESCO heritage listing for 2016, the Cultural Properties Committee said.The advisory p

Buncheong ceramics, white porcelain pieces among relics salvaged from underwater site

Romanian-born American theater director Andrei Serban has compared the famous classical Korean love story “Chunhyangjeon” to freely adapted works of Shakespeare. “Like Shakespeare’s stories, you can turn the story upside down, improvise and do the craziest experiments to recreate,” Serban said in a press conference on Wednesday about his new production “Andrei Serban’s Different Chunhyang,” which will be staged with the National Changguek Company from Nov. 20 to Dec. 6. “But at the end of the da

MINNEAPOLIS ― She’s a therapist and career coach, cheerleader and wise woman, secret keeper and borscht pusher.Mostly, 85-year-old Gretta Freeman of Golden Valley, Minnesota, is chief executive officer of perhaps the most endearingly run support group in the Midwest, and likely beyond. Unfortunately for us, membership is closed.For 18 years, Freeman has guided her seven grandchildren, now grown, through myriad life passages and challenges. She has done this through her Grandma’s Roundtable, a pe

PITTSBURGH ― They crawl and they feed on rotting flesh and sinew, appearing to pulsate as they strip the skull and thorax of a small rodent. The sight of them might give a chill or turn a stomach, but it is simply nature at work.The grubs of dermestid (or skin, hide or carrion) beetles are scavengers that feed on the carcasses of the deceased and are commonly found on roadkill or, more grimly, on abandoned corpses.But in a 208-liter aquarium tank on the coffee table of a Pittsburgh apartment, th

SANTA BARBARA, California ― Joe McCabe sits on a wooden bench and calls out to two men strolling up State Street, “Have any spare change? I’m actually a traveler.”The men continue walking, and McCabe grumbles a homophobic slur that they don’t hear.McCabe gets up from the park bench and saunters down State Street in the opposite direction. At the corner, he stretches his right arm out to a woman wearing short shorts and high heels. She grimaces and looks at her friends questioningly as she maneuv

BALTIMORE, Maryland ― As a young girl, Downing Jett Kay danced to music played on a Victrola and watched Model T’s drive through the streets of Baltimore.She wore her hair in a flapper’s bob as a member of Forest Park High School’s Class of 1926, conducted interviews during the Depression for the Gallup Poll and listened to President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s fireside chats on the radio.Kay, who is to turn 107 next month, attributes her longevity to two factors: drinking lots of coffee and maintai

FORT WORTH, Texas ― Jessica Mary Hunter made two significant choices in life, her father said.The latter killed her.“Her first choice was accepting Jesus Christ,” her father Alan Hunter said, tears welling up in his eyes. “And her second was to take this drug.”Jessica, 21, died on Oct. 8, three days after taking Ecstasy with friends at the Austin City Limits Music Festival. It was the first time she had taken the party drug, friends said.Weeks after their daughter’s death, her parents remain dum