When Rag & Bone, an American fashion label, opened its doors in 2010 in Manhattan’s Nolita neighborhood, it was met with an unwelcome surprise. The white walls of its building were vandalized by locals and tainted with scribbles and markings. Out of this initial eyesore, the owners decided to transform the wall into a creative space for artists to showcase their artwork.

After a week or two in the South Korean capital of Seoul, newcomers often harbor extreme views on the city. They either love it or absolutely despise it. The first cohort can’t get enough of this Asian metropolis of almost 10 million people. They find endless fun in its pulsating nightlife, surfeit of palaces and temples, and cheap vodka-like booze called soju. Hiking up its peaks (yes, Seoul has peaks), they are mesmerized by its never-ending skyline.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visited a controversial shrine to World War II dead, including 14 convicted war criminals, ignoring U.S. advice against gestures bound to strain already tense relations with neighbors China and South Korea. Abe told Japanese news media the visit was intended "to report the progress of the first year of my administration and convey my resolve to build an era in which the people will never again suffer the ravages of war."

Yep, you read that headline right. North Korea returned to the days of yore this week when it decided to conduct its warmongering via fax. Quaint. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, who is playing host to that other 1990s relic Dennis Rodman, sent a fax to South Korea this week threatening a “merciless” strike on the south “without notice” in response to anti-North Korea rallies in Seoul.

For the past three decades, Brazilian “telenovelas” have helped Cubans forget their litany of woes for an hour a day. But today, dozens of South Korean soap operas are earning wide audiences. Following in the footsteps of South Korean films and K-pop, “doramas” — South Korean soaps dubbed into Spanish — first appeared on Cuban televisions earlier this year.

There is a submerged rock in the Yellow Sea that seafaring Korean families once believed to be the home of the spirits of dead fishermen. The rock’s name in English is Socotra Rock; in Korea, it’s referred to as Ieodo, and in China the Suyan Rock. Whatever the language, it’s at the center of a new global hot zone that is threatening to destabilize relations in East Asia.

China seemed to take the air out of the Geneva Accord on Iran with its simultaneous announcement last week that it is creating an Air Defense Identification Zone (ADIZ) in the East China Sea. The ADIZ will be implemented by the Chinese Ministry of Defence and obliges all aircraft flying in the zone to accommodate a number of rules including: the identification of flight plans, the presence of any transponders and two-way radio communication with Chinese authorities.

The main streets of Shin-Okubo — Tokyo’s Koreatown — are lined with smoky barbecue restaurants and overlit cosmetics emporiums. Staircases lead down to basement music venues and up to hidden drinking holes. Japanese once thronged the neighborhood, which is home to many ethnic Koreans and known for its fiery food and late nights. But in recent months, the crowds have thinned, replaced by anti-Korean protesters who have turned Shin-Okubo into a rough barometer of deteriorating Japan-Korea relations.