Adventures of the Korean who Can't Speak Korean: Food, Class, and Food... All Day Errday

DISCLAIMER: If you do not enjoy seeing amazing pictures of Korean food, I encourage you to STOP reading my blog :)

Whoa. That was quick. One week of Korea already over... about eleven more to go!! You know how people say "Yeah.. it feels as if I got here yesterday." Well, that doesn't apply here. I feel like I've been here for such a long time already, which is AWESOME.

Sorry for kind of slacking off on my posts, but it's tough to update you guys on everything that's going on... I'll either post a bunch of short things here and there OR I'll wait and just post a humongous one, and this is the latter :D If you don't like reading, just scroll through and check out the purrty pictures, I guess.

Showing my red, white, and blue colors

For this post, I'll try to use food as a time reference, because that's one of the few areas of expertise I can fall back on in this place. On the first day that I got here, I felt like I had to resist the cultural immersion at least for a little bit, so I went with a good old-fashioned American meal: McDonald's breakfast. As soon as I bit into my Sausage McMuffin, though, I knew that even McDonald's had it's own Korean twist to it. They don't even call it McDonald's breakfast here... they call it "McMorning." I know...cheesy AND blasphemous.

This is where I live (Ilsan)! Not Seoul, but still more exciting than New Jersey

I guess I kept on with the stubbornness for that weekend, as I saw the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie for my first official activity in Korea! For random spurts throughout the movie, I tried to block out the English that I heard and attempted to understand what was going solely by reading the Korea subtitles. I ended up with some pretty crazy plot holes, so I got some extra motivation for doing my best in class. Afterwards, an amazing lunch cheered me up :) I held off on the BBQ (too expected) for now, and went with something pretty indie:

They put an egg inside of the bread WHILE it's frying... so simple, yet so complex

I'm in the one place in the world where I don't feel shame taking a picture like this

Street food is ALWAYS a great choice... the ingredients/hygiene might be slightly sketch, but it's always cheap and delicious, so win-win. I stayed abstinent (from BBQ) for about 5 hours, then I gave into the temptation. I went with my cousins and grandparents to a place famous for its 돼지불고기 (beef-like pig meat), and I released my inner carnivore. It's weird, how something like meat (Korean-style) can taste SIGNIFICANTLY better in one place than another.

Straight out of the kitchen

It's getting ready to get...

OWNED

I don't leave any survivors...

Except for those... because only wimps eat vegetables pshhh

I couldn't go too long without meat even after this ridiculous meal, so the next day I had BBQ for lunch. This place was a little more intense, and the meat just kept coming and coming, and I wouldn't have it any other way. Restaurants always give you lots of vegetables to eat with the meat, just to keep the BBQ "healthy" so that was sometimes annoying, but I still had a good time :)

That's how I ate it :) haha just kidding... I wish, though...

Mmhmm

Untouched and unloved

You guys will be seeing lots of pictures like this one, so I guess I'll explain what exactly it is (even though it's pretty self-explanatory): Lettuce (쌈, or ssam), Meat (고기, or goh-gi), and Red Pepper Paste (고추장, or gochujang)

Ehh, so I realized that after posting two of these "food-time continuum" things, it might get pretty darn repetitive, so I'll just do it the old fashioned blog way, and post pictures of food at the end :D 'Twas fun while it lasted...

So anyway, I started classes last week at Sogang University!!! It's been a VERY smooth transition, so far, and the classes are going well. I think they purposely split up all of the Korean-Americans in the program, so I am the only Korean in my class. That wasn't all too helpful for my insecurities at first, because everyone in the class (composed of Japanese, Chinese, American, Taiwanese, and French students) was learning an entirely new language, and I was learning one that I was "supposed" to already know. It's been relatively easy to grow out of that, though, because everyone else has been so encouraging and mature towards me (that might have a little bit to do with the fact that the next youngest student in my class is 27, and that a good number of them are married with kids). When I see people at that age taking on a new language, I really hope that I grow up (eventually) to have that same willingness to take initiative, to journey into the unknown even past my prime.

But that's still a long way off :D and as a teenager (actually, I'm 20 in Korea), I love those moments when I can step back into my comfort zone. And the best way to do that was to meet up with all of the Yalies in Korea :) And there are surprisingly lots of them here, so that' wasn't too hard.

So, yeah... it's been awesome to be able to grab lunch with these guys after class and just meet up with them at random points in the day. BUT we all promised that we would try to make more of an effort to branch out (even though native Koreans look at us as if we're a different species... something I'll definitely touch more upon on my next entry since I don't want to ruin the mood of this one).

Last weekend, I also took a nice step away from urban life and went on a mini two-day vacation into the mountains with family :) My uncle and his wife have this random, but really nice house in the middle of the mountains, and we stayed there.

The place looks nice, but because it's still nature-y, it was SWARMING with bugs. And I don't really deal well with bugs. I showered in fear as a grasshopper looked onto my exposed body from the windowsill, along with a spider chilling on the wall, waiting for me to move closer so he could pounce on me...
Other than that, it was awesome. Of course, a party ain't a party without the BBQ. And it was a party.

That's my uncle, grilling steaks like a champ... and that's my cousin creepily looking on

Life of the party

How I do

Just because it's morning doesn't mean we have to stop... party for breakfast

Sausage shaped like a flower/crown/Sideshow Bob's hair

Da family :D

As you can see, spending time with family was pretty darn crazy. But it's something I definitely needed, something I want to do again. I don't get to see much of them because they live in Korea in the first place, and I won't get to see them much with my/their crazy schedules even though we live maybe 20 minutes from each other. Spending the weekend with them really made me feel at home in this foreign land, in a genuine way of course (as opposed to the temporary rush I get from eating McDonald's here). Sure, I miss my mom/dad/sisters, but with my aunts/uncles/cousins/grandparents, I've got a pretty good sense of base here. And that weekend gave me that extra sense of motivation to work for that feeling of belonging, something that I can achieve again through my language studies, and something that will hopefully bring me closer to these guys.

And surprisingly, this weekend was FAR from over. The next day, I decided to go someplace that would let me access my inner-child. If you haven't guessed where by now....

Yup... we came to Korea's remake of the place where dreams come true: Disney World. I went with a couple of other Yalies and their cousins, and oh, did we have an amazing time (as you can see from me and Brandon above).

Family portrait... yellow style

Disney World... kinda

My new boo

Despite Julie's reaction in the video of GYRO DROP above, we did end up riding it and it was CRAZY. Awesome way to start off the week of classes :) Before beginning my growing-up process, it made perfect sense to have a reverse process to prepare for it. After Lotte World, I went with the same group of awesome people to one of the most popular malls in Korea, called COEX.

Something I get way too much of at home

Why can't malls in America be this cool?

Interactive maps?? Why can't malls in America have this?

Complex architecture in the food court?? Why can't.... ahh you win, Korea. You win.

This place was like an underground labyrinth. We got lost at least 5 times, and were so occupied walking through different corridors that we didn't even have to shop.

Later on in the week (actually this past Wednesday), there was a dinner at the Yale Club of Korea for all of us in Korea. It was great to have EVERYONE there at once, as that will not likely happen again this summer :( And we also got to meet prefrosh. I didn't end that sentence with an exclamation point because frankly, I hate all prefrosh. Seeing them reminds me that I'm getting older, that I'm no longer going to be babied as a freshman by the upperclassmen. Who do these guys think they are, coming into my house and taking my place? Sophomore slump has to happen because of these little boys and girls, the new freshmen. But at least for that night, I put aside my longing to hold onto my youth (especially by reminding myself that I wasn't as old as the juniors, seniors, graduates, old people, etc.), and really got to connect with the young'ns at the dinner. I felt older, but also wiser and more mature (I don't think that'll last too long, but whatever). Jeez... something about Korea keeps trying to force me to grow up. Maybe it's Korea, or maybe that's just how life works. It's making me too tired to think about it, though, so I'm going to bed.

Food, take it away (more happened this past week, but this blog is getting way too long, so for next time!):