I Live In Korea

Just some pictures from a night this weekend......

Weekend started at a Hotel which is decked out in Christmas decorations...


Next we had an all you can eat/drink buffet which was delicious, and cost $30. Very nice roast which was a good supplement for Thanksgiving...


Played one spin of roulette and won. The win paid for the dinner. We were in a good mood from the win/good meal so we decided to ball it up a little bit and smoke some Cuban cigars...


Continuing with this theme, it was time for some champagne at this cool bar...


Time for our weekly hookah. Sangria was delicious too..


The night started at 6pm and we got back at 9:15am after a marathon session of noraebang (karaoke)... Here's my breakfast, fried chicken. I look like a mess, but what do you expect considering the long, debaucherous night...


Life...is good.

Korean kids have NO SHAME in talking about their teachers. Kids walk right up to me and say I have a big nose, big head, I’m ugly, when my nostrils flare I look like a dragon, I smell like "ddong" (shit), the lines on my forehead are disgusting, etc. They pull no punches, it’s really weird because they are much better behaved than kids in the US, but it’s somewhat acceptable to comment on people’s physical features.

So we have to read journals for our students, the Korean teacher and the English teacher read them. The journal topic for one lesson is “Write About Your Teacher." A few weeks ago this one class I have wrote about their Korean teacher, I was a little bummed, I was hoping to read things about me. One of the students wrote in his journal that he “got sick looking at the Korean teacher. Her face is disgusting and I hate her.” There was more to the journal (a lot more) but that’s the gist of it. Again, when the journals are finished the Korean teacher AND me have to read it, and this kid wrote nasty things about the girl!! When I read it, I ripped his journal entry into pieces! He may have gotten in trouble for not having his journal, but I don’t care.

Anyway, last week, the same class had to write about "Ben Teacher." Let’s see what these little devils had to say..

“Ben teacher hit John, but he didn’t hit me so I like him. Thinking him to hit John because John is very noisy and John me next to seat and not understand his speak. His speech so fast, I want slowly speech and I am thinking he heigh is 185 centimeters. I want slowly speech Ben teacher. By the way first I think teacher very kind but now I think teacher very so-so.” LOL, I never hit John, I think the kid means I HATE John, which I kind of do. John is the kid who wrote the nasty things about the Korean teacher and he is often a pain in the butt.

“Ben teacher is very very very very very very very bad. Haha, no, he is so-so. He is funny and he kind because he give me some gift. I’m not love him but I’m not hate him.”

“My English teacher name is Ben. He is very tall. He takes glasses on his eyes. He everyday have a bottle water. He is funny, he can’t Korean says. He is everyday wear t-shirt, I see he is very cold. My English teacher is a good teacher.”

“My teacher is name is Ben teacher. He is very bad teacher because teacher drink water but we are doesn’t drink water he says. Teacher I am so thirsty I says. Teacher says ‘no sit down,’ teacher is very heartless.” That’s John, the kid who said the Korean teacher’s face makes him sick and who’s friend claims I hit. lol.

“My teacher’s name is Ben teacher. He is my English teacher, he is from America. He is tall. He is handsome and he is smart. Tomorrow is Ben teacher’s class. I like Ben teacher.” I LIKE YOU TOO CHLOE!

“My teacher name is Ben teacher. Ben teacher is very kind and angry. He teaches English and speaking very well. He works at JC school. He has short hair. He is from America. I like my teacher.” Kind AND angry? Interesting…

“Ben teacher is very kind and handsome. Very will English and very nice teacher. Teacher, I study English very well yes!”

“My teacher name is Ben. He is English teacher. He from USA, he has big eyes, short hair, a big mouth, he is tall and he is very kind and smart because he teaches many people. I think he is a very good teacher.”

“My English teacher is Ben. I think Ben teacher is very like mischief. Because from day one very very mischief but I like Ben teacher and I love Ben teacher.”

This is just from ONE of my 14 classes. I look forward to the “write about your teacher” journal topic in the future.

I know the kids are young, but I really can't imagine kids in America being so...open? I think we would lie or just skate around the subject if we hated our teacher. It's fascinating to read some of the journals where the kids talk about their family, if they think their parents love them or not, their friends, etc. They are sharing their thoughts and emotions with me and they don't even realize it, or do they?

Kids here are really obsessed with a few things, some are very weird…

1. Shit – Yeah, shit. Whether it’s teaching lessons on the five senses, drawing a birthday cake or just in your everyday “make fun of the teacher who can’t speak Korean,” bringing up “ddong” (shit) happens quite often in school. The really weird thing is that every student draws shit the same way, looking like a volcano.

There is no other variety. I have seen AT LEAST 20 pictures of shit and they are always the same, meanwhile I can’t get a consistent answer from most kids when I ask them what their favorite animal is. Go figure. Is making students draw shit a part of the curriculum?

2. Poking people in the butt (especially teachers) – a day doesn’t go by where I have my back turned to the wall, or I’m walking down the hall and some kid doesn’t try sneaking behind me and poking me in the butt. It’s really weird.

3. Kai Bai Bo (aka rock, paper, scissor) – I played this about 20-30 times a day my first two months, now I’ve got the kids on other games or they just ask me to pick them up as high as I can in the air and fling them around. It really makes me wonder if kids in Korea ever heard of a shoulder/piggy back ride. Still, the students use rock, paper, scissor to settle important things like who will do their presentation first. I won’t lie, I’ve even used it a couple times with my friends or coworkers to decide who the person is who’s going to do something.

4. Sharp Razors – more of a weird thing than an obsession, but these are in EVERY kids pencil case and it is quite disturbing…


I see them used as a scissor, but some kids also sharpen their pencils with them. These things are EXTREMELY sharp and I don’t see how they are more useful than a pencil sharpener for a student. I was appalled when I first saw these in my students' pencil cases.

5. Saying an absent student is dead – This is me taking attendance on one of my first days here…

Ben – “William….”(silence)
Blaire – “William die…”
Ben – “What?”
Blaire – “William die…I kill” (class erupts in laughter)
Ben – “You killed William?” (just playing along, seeing where this goes)
Blaire – “Yes…Scissor (makes cutting gesture) cut head” (class laughs again)

(William walks in 10 minutes later)

Blaire – “ZOMBIE!”

Other class…

Ben – “Martin…”
Martin – “Here”
Ben – “Martin how are you?”
Martin – “Terrible”
Ben – “Why terrible?”
Martin – “Teacher die!”
(class erupts in laughter)

Not only is it rude, but the grammar and structure of the sentence is off. What they are trying to imply is that they feel terrible because the teacher is alive, and they want me to die. “Teacher die” is the way of saying that in two short words.

This happens all the time as well. Now I know all my students’ names, but I still ask where they are if they are out and more often than not I hear “die”…“I kill”…“bus hit” etc. It’s disturbing but amusing.

6. Asking if you have a girlfriend – This was one of the first questions I heard from students upon introducing myself. I told them my name, and then they asked where I was from, my age, height (weird), weight (weird) and if I have a girlfriend. There’s almost a look of disappointment when I told them I don’t have one, and I think that has to do with the family values in Korea. Having a girlfriend/boyfriend makes you sort of…complete. Telling someone here you don’t have a girlfriend/boyfriend, will get you the same sort of response if you ask someone in the US what they do for work and they say they are unemployed, “oh…(looking down/changing subject quickly)”

7. Asking for your phone number – every class has asked for my phone number and/or email address. In general, it’s rude to say no to anyone over here. I get offered some weird snacks every day and the first time I said no thanks I got a very disappointed look from this girl and I felt bad. I ask people for directions and sometimes they want to BRING me to the place I ask them about, even if it means them jumping from behind their desk at work and going outside. No joke! Anyway, I can’t think of anything wrong about having their phone numbers (except texting someone when I’m drunk and clicking on their name instead, which hasn’t happened…yet….), but it is pretty weird. In America if kids had their teacher’s phone numbers they would be getting prank calls ALL the time. Here I just get random texts which say “hello Ben teacher, this is Mario. Have a nice day.” It’s cute, but I’m still concerned about the late night text finger slip. It’s done me in many times before (shaking my head thinking of past moments of feeling embarrassed).

8. Stickers and stamps – Kids here LOVE little stickers with cats, hearts or anything for that matter on them. They ask me all the time for stickers and I started putting them on their homework if they do a good job. I know this is done in the US with cheesy things like a gold star, but stationary stores here are FLOODED with sheets of stickers that kids buy and also hope they get from school.

Stamps are another thing. Same as stickers, they come in the shape of a pet, or say something like “very good!” When grading homework/classwork I have to circle their paper in red to confirm I looked at it. Recently I purchased a box of stamps and have been using that. On my first class using it, when I stamped a students page they freaked out, all the other students ran over to see and were amazed. I told them they only get it when their work is done and they all ran back to their desks and got cracking. I stood there and patted myself on the back. Remember, I only just started teaching, so I’m learning how to trick kids into doing their work.

Not sure if there’s any I missed, think I got it all…

No text needed for this post, the video speaks for itself...

I do hope to make some more of these types of videos which will show some insight into culture in Korea, and I even have some ideas of videos showing some things they have over here which are far more efficient than what we have in the U.S... in time....

The NY Times has been doing a fantastic job lately talking about Korean culture. Whether it's racial issues, adoption, or more racial issues, it's provided a lot of insight into society here. Keep up the good work...

Questioning a Korean Wedding Tradition
By CHOE SANG-HUN

When a daughter of Kim Jong-chang, South Korea’s top financial regulator, got married last June, Mr. Kim did something unusual: He eliminated the cashier and the cash-filled envelopes.

These are fixtures of a South Korean wedding, as much so as the wedding officiant. Before entering the wedding hall, guests line up in front of the cashier’s table to hand over an envelope stuffed with cash. The cashier opens the envelope and registers the guest’s name, and the amount given, in a velvet-covered ledger — often while the guest is still standing there.

“The problem with this tradition is that it can be abused for bribery,” said Mr. Kim, governor of the Financial Supervisory Service, which regulates the South Korean banking and securities industries. “In my case, many banking officials would have shown up with cash gifts. They would have wondered whether I was annoyed that they didn’t put enough in the envelope.”

Chipping in to help friends defray wedding or funeral expenses is an old custom here. But in recent months, it has been criticized as wasteful, and sometimes even as a conduit for vote-buying and bribery.

In May, after some critical news stories about extravagant weddings being held at five-star hotels during the economic downturn, President Lee Myung-bak exhorted South Korea’s rich and powerful to set an example in fighting the “vain and extravagant” wedding culture.

Mr. Kim is one of a small but growing number of people, from ordinary families to dignitaries, who are joining this campaign, refusing to accept cash gifts and keeping their guest lists relatively short. Ban Ki-moon, the South Korea-born secretary general of the United Nations, invited only a few close friends and relatives to the wedding of his son in May, as did Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan when his daughter married in April. In October, Chung Jung-kil, Mr. Lee’s chief of staff, followed suit.

Still, these low-key weddings were considered such oddities that they made the news.

In South Korea, where “face” is famously cherished, the measure of a family’s social standing is seen in the number of guests at weddings, as well as the amount of money given and the sumptuousness of the banquet. At funerals, the number of wreaths presented by friends, business associates and local politicians is a comparable social metric.

“Here, a wedding is less a celebration than an occasion for a family to show off,” said Lee Yoon-ji, who runs a wedding management agency and photo studio in Seoul’s upscale Kangnam district. “For instance, if the bride’s family finds its guests are much fewer than the groom’s, it’s humiliating.”

Some families send out thousands of wedding invitations. A bank account number is sometimes included so people who can’t attend can still send money.

Often, the decision of whether to attend is based on whether the couple, or their relatives, attended weddings or funerals in one’s own family — or might be expected to. Families keep records of how much they receive and from whom so that they can reciprocate. Failure to do so can ruin a friendship.

“Sometimes you even get invitations from people you don’t know very well,” Mr. Kim said. “They arrive like tax bills or I.O.U.’s.”

Every year, the roughly 330,000 South Korean couples who get married spend an average of 15 million to 20 million won, or $13,000 to $17,000, in wedding expenses, said Lee Woong-jin, head of Sunoo, a matchmaking company that conducts an annual survey on wedding expenses. The cost can exceed 50 million won for hotel weddings.

Much of that is covered by the cash gifts. Last year, South Koreans gave out 8 trillion won, or 524,500 won for each household, in cash gifts for weddings and funerals, according to the National Statistical Office.

“This is a ‘you-help-me, I-help-you’ tradition. I don’t see anything wrong with it. You chip in and you get help in return,” said Han Seung-ho, 33, a photographer whose wedding in October attracted 370 guests. “Without their cash gifts, my wedding would have been a serious financial burden for me.”

But these envelopes also reflect a culture in which giving cash is considered so natural that people sometimes call it a “greeting” — and, in some cases, use it as a cover for bribery. When South Korea’s election laws were revised in 2004, they banned politicians from giving cash envelopes, except at the weddings and funerals of close relatives.

Three candidates running for election at provincial farmers’ and fisheries’ cooperatives were indicted in September and October on charges of giving cash gifts at voters’ weddings. A provincial education chief was widely criticized in the media in April after he reportedly invited 2,000 people — including the principals of all 460 schools under his jurisdiction — to his son’s wedding.

Chung Woo-jin, 50, president of Q&Q Medi, a medical supplies company, said many wedding guests show up “reluctantly,” fearing they might lose out on business contracts or promotions if they don’t. “So they show up to prove that they were there, give the envelope and hurry off to have the meal, without even taking a look at the bride or groom,” he said.

Mr. Chung refused to accept cash envelopes at his mother’s funeral in June. But he said he still felt compelled to attend 40 to 50 weddings or funerals a year for friends, employees and business acquaintances, each time donating an average of 100,000 won.

Meanwhile, some younger couples are rebelling against what they call a “commercial” wedding culture controlled by parents. It is generally the parents who send out invitations, collect the cash and pay for the wedding, and by and large, more guests are there for the parents than for the couple getting married.

“Some of my friends feel frustrated, wondering if their wedding is for them or for their parents,” said Lee Eun-jeong, 35, who works at a publishing company in Seoul. She limited her wedding in June to 135 guests and did not accept envelopes. “We also hate it when a friend who hasn’t contacted us for years suddenly gets in touch with us before her wedding, obviously with our envelopes in mind,” she said.

South Korea has seen campaigns for wedding frugality before. In 1973, the late military strongman Park Chung-hee tried to ban written invitations, flowers and gifts from weddings and funerals, in the belief that such customs were wasteful and detracted from his campaign to build and modernize the economy.

But enforcement was sporadic at best, and experts say weddings grew more extravagant after 1999, when the restrictions were lifted and five-star hotels and wedding agencies entered the market.

Mr. Kim, the financial watchdog chief, predicted that it would be some time before the cash envelope tradition faded.

“Frankly, I found myself thinking, ‘I’ve given out all these envelopes over the years. Why shouldn’t I get them once for my daughter’s wedding?”’ he said. “It’s not always easy in our weddings to tell the difference between bribes and genuine gifts.”

Definitely music week here....

This is a pretty typical example of most of the songs I hear in Korea. "K-Pop," as it's dubbed, is similar to most of the nonsense you hear Brittney Spears, N'Sync, etc. come out with. They are catchy, the artists are all young, attractive and can dance. The videos or over the top, well choreographed and directly or indirectly very sexual in nature. Personally, I think the pop songs here are bigger than they are in the US because they dominate the airwaves everywhere. Whether you're in a store, supermarket, bars, etc., when a popular song is out it will be played all over and everyone will know it, from the 20 year old's dancing in a bar or my 8 year old students, they all know.

Anyway, this song is a few months old but it's probably my favorite. Check it out, there's English and Korean subtitles.

And yes, that IS a bomb she attached to the guy she used to like...

p.s. the comments that pop on the youtube video aren't mine, they are the person who uploaded and translated the song

Going to try to get another video up like this of some Korean dancers I encountered at some hiphop club. What I witnessed there was RIDICULOUS, hopefully I can edit it this week. Either way, check this video out, it's a good one....

Pepero Day is a ‘holiday’ in Korea, one which started only in the past decade or so. Pepero is a long, thin, chocolate cookie which is covered in chocolate (sometimes nuts, sprinkles, etc.). The ones from bakeries look really delicious...



...but the ones from stores which come in boxes aren’t as nice, and really just look like a long and thin Milano cookie sans the mint.

The holiday is celebrated on 11/11 because a Pepero looks like the #1. That’s it, people eat and give each other Pepro. That... is it. What a ridiculous holiday with no history, no true story behind it and just a consumer holiday in which half of the Pepero sold all year is done so in the month of November.

Here’s what my desk looked like yesterday at work from all the Pepero I got.

Students were hyper as hell yesterday for my afternoon classes (sugar rush) and in my night classes the kids were tired and complaining they were hungry (crash from eating too much sugar). This holiday is lacking an imaginary character, emotion, decorations, cards and everything else WE put into our consumer holidays. Step it up Korea.

A lot of Korean meals involve work on behalf of the customer, such as grilling your meat or boiling your meat. Even the buffet, which is supposed to be a lazy mans meal, involves some effort and waiting, no instant gratification like we have back home.

You get a giant pitcher of broth and a metal pot which is placed on a heater, then go to the buffet line to get all your vegetables, noodles, fish and meat, throw it into the pot, cook it up and go at it. Here's what the menu looks like....

Seafood...

Meat...this would NO DOUBT be a health or safety violation in the US. This is about, I don't know, 20 lbs of raw meat just out in the open. But somehow nothing bad happens in Korea and no one complains either...


Vegetables and Noodles....


Sides...

Not sure what the thing on the left is.............The balls of rice with seasoning packed inside lettuce
The thing on the right is gross.........................are delicious! Dip em in some hot sauce. Rice bombs!

Finished product....

Without easy access to bagels, oatmeal and pancake mix, I’m in a bit of a bind for breakfast. It would be quite easy to make eggs or buy cereal, but that would involve cooking the eggs (my kitchen is not up to my standards). Cereal/milk isn't up to my standards, nor is it hearty enough for me.

Rice and kimchi are staple dishes at pretty much all Korean meals, and soup is also a likely component of breakfast. This is obviously not exactly what I’m used to back home and again it involves cooking. Nowadays people are starting to eat more pastries as Dunkin Donut and Snap, Crackle and Pop become more popular around the world. Then there’s always toast, jam and fruit as an option.

Luckily for me there’s a bakery just outside my apartment that I frequent 5+ times a week. The vast majority of the time I order these three items…

The first is a sweet bean donut which I think is self-explanatory, it’s a donut with sweetened beans inside. While this may sound like an odd combination but I can assure you that not only is it delicious but it’s also somewhat healthy since it has beans in it. Plus this donut doesn’t have the same ingredients, nor is it cooked the same as donuts back in the US.

The next is just a cruller covered with sugar. Similar to the sweet bean donut, the pastry itself is not the same as the crap we eat back in the US. Even at Dunkin Donuts here the donuts taste a lot lighter. It’s due to the ingredients and there is also not nearly as much sugar on it.


Last is a thin breakfast burrito with onions, peppers, ham, egg, cheese, a mysterious yellow substance on top and a sprinkle of blackened sesame seeds. This egg burrito is delicious! These three things cost me $4, it fills me up and there healthy take on pastries here makes me feel fine to go for a run or to the gym shortly after I eat. Can’t beat it.

At 11am the baker brings out this dish though….


This is an egg sandwich which is phenomenal. There’s eggs, ham, LOBSTER, peppers, onions, melted cheese and carrots inside of a massive fried piece of dough. When I walk into the bakery after 11am, they know what I’m coming for and get it for me sometimes as they see me walking across the street. This costs $2.50, it’s huge and it again it’s delicious.

This is my breakfast 5 or 6 days of the week. The only time I won’t go to this bakery is if I’m extremely hungover and need something to clog my arteries. In which case I head to Lotteria. Lotteria is like an unholy alliance between Roy Rogers and Burger King with an Asian twist. Eventually I’ll get around to talking about Lotteria’s food and there top notch service... Eventually…Until then think about a place where you can get fried chicken, burgers and fries. While I stay away from fast food at home, again, it is cooked completely different here and it tastes a lot different to. I’ll get to that in time…

In light of the Phillies losing the World Series, I felt the need to make a post about one of my favorite spots in Korea for a quick bite. In fact, it might be up there in the pantheon of my favorite places to get a quick bite.

Located in the young, artsy and cultural hotbed of Hongdae (neighborhood in Seoul), lies a hole in the wall place called Queen’s Bite. Inside of this place which is easy to walk past, are just five small stools and enough room in the kitchen/counter for two workers and a very small menu. The place is decorated in baseball gear (albeit Phillies stuff) and during baseball season they have a TV on showing baseball (albeit Korean Baseball). Nevertheless, I got one of the better Philly Cheesesteaks I think I’ve had in my life.

Carl’s (NYC), Gino’s (Philly), Pat’s(Philly), Jim’s(Philly) and 99 Miles to Philly(NYC) all are very good cheesesteak places. I really enjoy the cheesesteaks there just like I enjoy a good Chinese lunch special, excellent while eating, sleepy, lethargic and regretting it 30 minutes later.

Let’s look at the tale of the tape…

Bun
Places in NYC & Philly – Regular bun
Queen’s Bite – Toasted bun

Meat
Places in NYC & Philly – chopped up crap that’s been sitting on a grill for hours rendering in its own fat
Queen’s Bite – marinated steak that is taken out and grilled only when someone orders a sandwich

Cheese
Places in NYC & Philly – processed American, processed provolone, canned cheese wiz slapped on top when the sandwich is nearly cooked
Queen’s Bite – two types of cheese that are melted into the sandwich while cooking

Vegetables
Places in NYC & Philly – peppers & onions that are again, sitting on the grill for god knows how long, cooked to the point where all of the nutrients and a lot of the taste is sapped away
Queen’s Bite – fresh, colorful vegetables thrown on the grill again, only when someone orders a sandwich

Why bother with the décor, friendly service, etc., when there’s really no comparison. Queen’s Bite wins.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t think this…




Looks as good as this…


What the hell, look at this place. Whether you’re a Phillies fan or Phillies hater, you gotta enjoy the décor of a little hole in the wall place in Korea which has MLB paraphernalia all over it.



This place has only been open two months and I’ve been here 4 times, it opened ironically enough the day I arrived. That’s what I call fate. I’m going to be a frequent customer here.

DIRECTIONS - get off the #2 (green) line at Hongik University, exit 5. Walk into the main area and make a right at the Volkswagon store, walk straight and Queen's Bite is on your left connected to a store called Tomato 24. The only address I can find in English says "358-9". Phone # 02-333-5069