I love Google. I use Gmail, Google Reader, and iGoogle regularly.
iGoogle is a customizable homepage that allows you to choose decorative themes to brighten your page up. My standard has been the teahouse theme that has a cute little fox going about his daily business. (The themes change according to the time of day.)

It’s kind of sad how dependent I am on Google actually, I usually have Gmail, iGoogle, and Google Reader open in my browser’s tabs at any given time.

ANYWAY. This post is not about my tech-dependency. It’s actually about Korea!

There is a Korean theme for the iGoogle page called Aja Tiger. (This is the theme on my main tab for iGoogle now.)
The tiger lives in a cave with a Dol Hareubang (돌 하르방) in the corner.

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Looks like she lives on Jeju-do (제주) , the biggest island in Korea. The Dol Hareaubang and the tall mountain in the background hint at Jeju. You can even see water in the distance – maybe it’s the ocean? I think the yellow flowers on the sides are the springtime rapeseed flower blossoms.

Jeju and the yellow flower fields

A picture of a hareaubang taken on Jeju-do.

All those details give a pretty convincing location for Ms. Tiger. However – tigers died out a long time ago in Korea – and I’ve never heard of them living on Jeju island.

Apparently the tigers that used to inhabit the Korean peninsula are the Siberian or Amur tigers.

Tigers were important in Korean folklore. You can read some korean tiger stories here (The art for the stories is a little cutesy for my liking though.)

Er – anyway. I like this theme, it’s cute and fun to look at. However – I noticed she didn’t eat her kimchi at lunch. That issue really needs to be addressed. She only ate her noodles!

I wish the tiger and the fox from the teahouse could get together. I guess they would have some cultural differences though, seeing as how the tiger is from a Korean theme and the fox is from a Japanese theme. I guess for now they’ll just have to be neighbors, living just a tab away from each other on my iGoogle.