ARIRANG NEWS 10:00 Korea presses pause as students take college entrance exams
ARIRANG NEWS 10:00 Hello and welcome... it′s 10am on Thursday the thirteenth of November... you are tuned in to our mid-morning newscast here on Arirang TV. I′m Mark Broome. Let′s take a look at what′s making the headlines. Korea presses pause this morning, with banks, offices and even the stock market staying closed for an extra hour as hundreds of thousands of students sit down to take the potentially life-changing college entrance exam. President Park Geun-hye calls for greater economic cooperation with India as she holds talks with the country′s recently elected prime minister ahead of the East Asia Summit in Myanmar. Plus,... jubilation at the European Space Agency as the Rosetta mission′s lander makes a historic landing on a comet hurtling through space. Title: Korea presses pause as students take college entrance exams But we start back here on Earth,... and more specifically Korea,.... where hundreds of thousands of high school seniors are taking the most important tests of their young lives today. Six-hundred-forty-thousand students at more than 12-hundred venues nationwide sat down for their College Scholastic Ability Test which officially got underway at 8.40am, Korea time. The test, which consists of five sections, will take eight hours to complete. The students′ results will decide whether they can get into the universities of their choice. In consideration for the exam takers,... banks and offices around the nation opened one hour later than usual... and more subway trains and buses ran to ensure students were not late. Even airplanes will be forbidden to make takeoffs or landings for 35 minutes in the afternoon... during the listening test hours. Title: Superstitions surround Korea′s college entrance exams So just how important is the College Scholastic Ability Test? Well... it′s so important that there are a number of superstitions students follow... in the hope it′ll get them a high score on the test. From not washing their hair… to eating certain types of food, some students say it′s better to go that extra mile just in case it works. Connie Lee has more. So how far would you go to ace your college entrance exams? "I won′t be washing my hair." "To do well on the exam, I am eating taffy and chocolates..." Um. Not your typical study habits... but the exam is deemed so important that students… will do whatever it takes for that high score even taking part in some superstitions. One of the biggest ones,... is that students eat the right snacks. It′s either taffy or rice cakes. Why? Because they′re sticky. These come in neat gift sets this time of year... as they say eating these snacks will help the study material "stick" in the students′ minds... And, help them "stick to" their top college choice from their high scores. While these snacks are okay to eat... one superstition says that test-takers should avoid eating... seaweed soup. So much so that some restau
