Once upon a time in Baguio, more specifically in our neighborhood in New Lucban, in front of the house of retired city fiscal Benny Carantes, there was a chapel ministered by a Korean couple. This was a time when you can count the number of Koreans in Baguio in less than a minute. Most of this Christian Korean couple’s parishioners then came from Bayabas in La Trinidad. One time, they decided that one particular October night is the end of the world.

So they were all praying and crying so loud that Fiscal Carantes came out in his pajamas maybe saying, WTF? It was the eve of the end of the world, I told him. Then the next day, there was no end of the world. The parishioners from Bayabas were so angry that they took whatever they can from the chapel (which is now a billiard den) and destroyed what they could not.

Which brings us to the present. Right now, Koreans are ubiquitous especially on weekends. They are all over. Some people are now saying that it is the end of the world. But now it is not the Koreans saying this. It is now what we would call, “concerned Baguio students.”

Koreatown
They say that the “invasion of Koreans” means the end of Baguio as they know it. Many people agree. There are now articles calling for a crackdown of this “Korean problem.”

I (hiding behind the so-called “editorial we”) say, cool down. It’s not the end of the world.

The Koreans are not here to invade the city. They are just here.

They rescued at least seven moribund hotels in the city and turned them into learning schools. One report had it that one of the owners of these hotels would want to retrieve it because his hotel is turning into a citadel for Jumong (should be Chumong).

They said that nothing is going to the city because they import their own cooks and food. They have their own convenience stores. They have their own restaurants. They are turning the city into a Koreatown.

Well, yes. Los Angeles has a Koreatown and the L.A. riots in the middle 1990s actually had a lot to do with this anti-Korean sentiment. So, should we start finding our torches and start our own riot?

Hold on to your biases and look at your history.

Baguio is a city of migrants. Hey, even Ilocanos are not really from here, you know. What if the Ibalois drove away your ancestors?

Even at the beginning of the 20th century, we have the Chinese wave followed by the Japanese wave. Maybe the Korean wave just came out much longer.

The Americans come and go. I heard that the next waves would be the Nepalese and the Indians.

So we have a history of waves. But more so, we have a history of tolerance.

That is why the vision of Daniel Burnham (who incidentally did not come here, only did his plans by remote control) that only 30,000 people should be allowed here held true for only a few decades.

The city is too schizo to decide whether it should be a tourist town or an educational center. If there is a plebiscite, this should be it. We cannot be one and still be the other.

If we want to be an educational center, well we should protect our students by outlawing all the liquor stores and night clubs.

If we want to have a tourist town, those student dormitories should be converted into inns and casinos should be considered, unless we want Baguio to adopt councilor Galo Weygan’s vision of a Christian Enchanted Kingdom.

But we want them both and the Korean situation fits to the mold. They come here as tourists and also want to learn English.

And whether we deny it or not, they are bringing in money to the city.

Self sustaining and beneficial
A friend told me years ago that some of the Korean language schools no longer need Baguio residents to teach them. They then have computers where they talk with supposedly Americans or English across the globe and they interact virtually. That friend later told me that that did not work out either as it is more expensive getting these Americans to sit down and talk with these Koreans.

And if you stay in some of these Internet shops, you would chance upon some customers talking through computers to Korean pupils back in Korea. Not only are they teaching them English but also other subjects. And of course, while talking to these pupils, these young teachers were also opening their “Friendsters” and what not.

So, human interaction wins the game for the Pinoys.

The assumption that the Korean money revolves only among themselves is not true.

Take Starbucks. It is a gourmet coffee shop frequented by Koreans. A barista told me that 70 percent of their customers are Koreans. Maybe 10 percent are

British or Americans. This 80 percent enables the 20 percent, which means us, to drink our coffee there for two months and just read or write.

Camp John Hay is now disparagingly called “Kim June Hee” because majority of the golfers are Koreans. I talked to Jeric Hechanova and he said, “I don’t see any problem. They are bringing in income.”

There are now 250 caddies because of Korean golfers when there used to be only 100. Some of these caddies bring home at least P15,000. Yes, the Koreans are bigger tippers than the Manileños who complain.

As a result, the golf course is going to be improved. Expensive bent grass is going to be planted on the greens. An expensive maintenance system used in the Augusta tournament will also be installed in at least six of the greens. The clubhouse will be enclosed at night and nightly entertainment would come in.

Last year, the Koreans are mostly guests of John Hay but to save, they decided to buy shares which jacked up the price of stocks here. In other golf courses, the price went down.

The reason is that many Koreans decided to reside here. The problem now is who acted as their dummies for them. Should we investigate this? By all means, yes. Should we crucify them? Ask their dummies.

A travel agency employee also told me that a huge chunk of their customers are now Koreans. They want to go to other places in the Philippines more than we do.

And didn’t you notice that the lowly wombok has become more expensive because the Koreans would buro them for their kimchi? The availability of wombok and horse radish actually was cited as reason for the Korean exodus here.

Let us not forget that they buy a lot of pirated DVDs, and forage the ukay-ukay shops. The branded ones have become expensive because the Koreans have been buying them without much haggling. Hey, that should count as a complaint against them.

But then the Korean fashion sense has rubbed on to some Pinoy fashionistas. Our students have become more avant-garde and playful like the Koreans.

Which is to say that the Koreans are not the boorish probinsyanos we think they are. Many of them are enrolled at Brent School where the tuition can go to thousands of dollars. They dine in fancy restaurants. Some are even jazz habitués and even country-western fans.

Reminds us of…us
Last weekend I was at the football field watching the Koreans play. They are actually polite the way they play football. And the mere fact that they are interested in football sparked hope for us who think that Pinoys have gone hopelessly or pathetically basketball-crazy.

Because of this renewed interest in football, the football ground is being maintained again. Those who think that the Pinoys must excel in basketball should remember that it was Shin Dong Pa of the South Korean team who repeatedly put daggers into our hearts years ago and we never listened.

I have a hunch that some of us Baguio people don’t like Koreans because they remind us too much of…us.

They drink too much. They love to play jokes on each other. They eat dog.

Koreans drink the most liquor per capita among Asians; that makes them rowdy and noisy just like most of us. But if they fight, they fight among themselves.

Who fights in the streets? Yes, it’s your high schooler who thinks they belong to the Crips and the Bloods.

I remember in 1986 an incident about a Korean walking along Burnham who was mugged by three drunks. Guess who the taekwondo master was and guess the three who became the punching bags.

The Koreans here settle their fights among themselves. They call their leaders and more often than not, the protagonists are reprimanded and even brought back to Korea.

Their fondness for song and drinks was evident because the first establishment that made us notice them was Korphil, which is a videoke bar.

Angel Villaralbo used to bring me there and he said he liked it there because you sing in front unlike the Philippine style where the microphone comes to you.

Later when I went to Los Angeles, I would frequent the Korean karaoke bars with our Korean friends because there simply is no Filipino videoke bars. The Filipinos would rather sing at home, which of course misses the point of karaoke.

They have one Filipino song in their Korean songbook back in LA and that song is “Bayan Ko.”

Roland Tolentino recalled singing that with the Koreans and it brought tears to his eyes.

There was also one young man back in 1996 who was so naughty that his friends pasted posters all over town saying that he is missing.

Well, every night at that time he was in Rumours. He would drink too much and one time, he forgot where the restroom was and relieved himself right there at the bar. He was funny and friendly that was why he was not manhandled by Mel, the bartender.

Last year he came back and was drinking in Rumours. “Hey, you are the one who pissed here,” one of the regulars reminded him.

“Yes, yes. I had a fine time in Baguio. I will never forget this place,” he said. “I’m a good man now.”

Then he ordered drinks for all of us.