Too Much Probing

I read a daily English-language Korean newspaper -- the old-fashioned kind, made of paper.  It is delivered to our building lobby by an alien for all I know - in 3 years I have not once spotted the responsible person/truck/spaceship.  Most mornings my paper is then tossed into the elevator by a lovely Alabama couple who enjoys walking together in the hours before make-up and business suits are required.  Some time later the paper is then tossed/kicked out of the elevator onto our 5th floor, from whence my earliest-rising husband or children hurl/kick it down the hallway toward our apartment.

I love this social network that gets my folded paper and its trusty yellow rubber band across the country to my doorstep. Some mornings, though, the headlines are in rather poor taste.  For example, today's headline shouted that "{President} Park will cooperate with criminal probe." That particular word choice seems to be a favorite lately.  A few months ago, the day's top headline read, "Lotte's {CEO} Shin flies home to face a widening probe;" the poor man vowed to sincerely cooperate with this distasteful procedure. And on that same front page, another article about captured spies stated that "The two suspects are now in custody and being probed."  And on page 2 that day, this puzzling headline, "Vietnamese suspects tried to incite broader mutiny probe."

Now, this is a reputable paper.  But somehow it has escaped these fine folks that legal investigations might be better called, oh, say, "investigations" or "inquiries."  At least in America, their particular word choice recalls lurid stories of aliens abducting humans and (inexplicably) proceeding with...probing.  Sometimes English just doesn't work across cultures.  Ah, Korea.  :)