Rather than give a play-by-play of my life for the last 5 months, I'll try to jot down some of my observations both of how I've changed and how my fiance dealt with the entirely new experience of living in a country he'd never been to and couldn't really speak the language of very well.
For me, it felt like I had been gone a million years and come back a different person to a totally different world, but at the same time it felt as though I had left only a day before and nothing had really changed. Upon arriving in America, suddenly my 9 months in Korea seemed like a dream that had passed in the blink of an eye but contained so many experiences. The fast-slow time paradox still hasn't faded, as I realize that this semester I had dreaded so much is almost over. As I write, I should be studying or writing one of my numerous papers due this week, final exam week at Michigan State University. This is my last full semester here; I will finish my studies on July 1st. That day can't come soon enough. But where did the time go? Was I ever in Korea? Was I ever here before, searching for a way out? Will the day I leave again ever come? Time is anything but exact. It's a subjective measure applied objectively to an abstract phenomenon. I hate time. It's never on my side. I guess that's because I only notice it when it doesn't work in my favor.
It takes about 2 weeks to get over jet lag when you fly between Asia and America. This is a generally accepted reality, and it was no different for Kyu Won and I. Amidst a dream-like state, we celebrated Christmas with my mother and brother, and then again with my brother, father, and stepbrother. Everything in my family happens in twos. If you include the extended families and stepfamily, things sometimes happen in fives. This could be part of the reason I'm good at adapting. I'm always changing anyway, why not be a chameleon? Anyway, both American Christmases were just like I remembered them, plus a feeling of awkwardness and a sense that I didn't belong. I've always had that sense that I don't belong in my family. I also had the sense that I didn't belong in my friend groups in elementary, middle, and high school. I always have a sense that I don't belong anywhere, except when I'm alone with my fiance. That's a good sign for our relationship.
After coming back to America, that sense of being an included outcast became even greater. I had two roles in conversation: telling everyone else about Korea, or listening to everyone else talk about things I didn't know about. I still think in Korean often, and at the beginning, I inserted Korean words into English conversations. I was always trying to bring up Korea because I had nothing else to talk about; it was like the "word vomit" Lindsay Lohan's character has issues with in Mean Girls. At some point it became evident that nobody cared, but I couldn't stop. I needed to be admired so that I could stand out of the group in a positive way rather than in an awkward way.
I know Kyu Won felt even more awkward, because he couldn't understand the fast speech, slang, and complicated words and phrases in American conversation. He had only heard me speak to one American in Korea, and to my best friend, who is Korean but has studied in America for like 6 years and is fluent in English. With my best friend, Jenny, we could also speak in Korean, and she could translate anything one of us couldn't understand, so it wasn't really an American conversation. My family is sarcastic and witty, and tends to talk about technical things, as both my parents and my brother are or were engineers. My mother is a lawyer now but has worked as an engineer for companies like GM and NASA. My father is an automotive engineering sales manager after working his way up the ladder. You may remember I saw him on a business trip in Korea. My brother majored in electrical engineering and is basically a wonder boy. He programs and builds things for computers, guitars, motorcycles, and more, and he once built a high-tech motorcycle with touch screen rear-view mirrors and Windows XP installed. I almost failed statistics in high school and college, and my major is International Studies and Psychology. I can't keep up with my family. I always feel like the dumb one in my family, although I know I excel in other things, like languages and music composition. The other problem with the huge difference between the rest of my family and I is that I always feel alienated, like I love them but I don't know how to talk to them. This got a hundred times worse. Hopefully I also excel in acting and nobody noticed that I was more awkward than usual. Kyu Won must have felt like my pet, calmly sitting or standing by me, listening only to me, and not understanding what anyone was saying. I remember how that felt in Korea, and I still feel that way sometimes although I've improved a lot. Everyday conversations in Korean give me confidence because I can follow them, but as soon as things get technical I feel like a moron again. It doesn't matter whether it's my family talking about microcontrollers or my fiance's family reminiscing. Both are foreign languages to me, and it was strange to come back to America and make that connection.
I realized that language is not just English, Korean, French, or Japanese. Each language has its own sub-languages that only certain sub-cultures can understand. Take generation gaps in slang, for instance. Try telling you grandparents that you lol'd when your bff friended your bf's homie on Facebook coz he's smokin' hot. Technical terms and concepts create a huge language barrier between my family and I. Instead of thinking of language as purely a country- or ethnicity- based construct, I've begun to think of it in more multilateral terms. What I mean by that, for those of you who don't speak my language, is that languages aren't just alphabets and vocabulary. Language is made up of so many different factors. For instance, I have a English conversation student from Korea who is studying for her master's degree in statistics. If she were to explain what she's studying in depth (thankfully she doesn't torture me like that), I would probably have no idea what she was talking about. Although she is the foreigner and I am the American, I would not be able to understand her speaking prefect English. What a concept! I think languages like English and Korean are just the modes of expression, and that people who speak different languages could actually be speaking the same one but not understand each other. I'll explain that with the same student. If she talked to a Chinese student studying for a master's degree in statistics in Germany, they could talk about the same thing in four different languages and never understand each other, just like a doctor, a lawyer, a fisherman, and a chef could talk about their fields in the same language and never understand each other. To fully understand a conversation, you need to be fluent in two languages: the topic and the linguistic means of talking about that topic. You could expand on that and say that culture is a language. I've always thought that music is a language, but I never saw this big jumbled picture before. All of this because I don't understand my family any better now that I went to another country for 9 months than I did before I left.
This redefines compatibility for relationships. I realize why I love Kyu Won. We speak the same language, even though he speaks Korean and I speak English. We think in similar ways, and the ideas trying to get out are similar enough that we can break through the language barrier on the surface and reach a greater understanding of each other than I can with any of my friends or family members. We can't have witty reparte, and we can't chit chat for hours about nothing without difficulty. But we often don't realize that our conversations are strange and incomprehensible to others, or that we are from different countries and ancestries. To me, he's not Korean first, and to him I'm not American first. Those things are way down the list of things we think of when we think of each other, but they're the first things we use to describe each other to others.
So how do you talk to someone who doesn't speak your language? Speak another language you both know. Although most of our early conversations were about 60% body language and 40% a grammatically incorrect, unclear mix of jumbled words in Korean and English, I remember the ideas Kyu Won expressed to me as if they were expressed fluently in English. I merely translated those conversations into a format easier to file in my memory. Try it. Talk to someone from another country. Find a language you can share with someone you can't understand. It's amazing.
On March 26, 2009, I left my life in America and moved to South Korea. I put my worldly possessions into two suitcases and a backpack and got on a plane. On December 8, 2012, I returned not to my hometown of Detroit, but to Silicon Valley, California, where I married an Indian engineer. In 2020, I divorced and moved to southern California. In this blog are my successes, failures, and observations of life in different cultures.
Monday, May 3, 2010
Monday, February 8, 2010
Coming Back to America
On Christmas Day, 2009, my boyfriend, his father, his little brother, and I all went to the Incheon International Airport early in the morning. Those of you who have traveled internationally know that it is very stressful, and this was no exception. I was tired from our day at Everland and sleeping on a Korean futon on the floor (like a thick blanket rather than a mattress), and I'm not a morning person anyway. Although my boyfriend's father had traveled internationally for business quite a bit in the past, airline policies have changed a lot in the past ten years, so he was in the dark about what to do. After my travels from America to Korea and between Korea and Japan, I was the foremost expert on the subject. Unfortunately, I am to this day stressed out about missing planes, getting arrested for nothing, or whatever else can go wrong. What I'm trying to say is that nobody had a head about them. However, we managed to get on the right plane with plenty of time to spare despite confusing information given me by the airline desk that led me to believe we would miss our flight and thereby freak out. My boyfriend's father's last memory of me is a jittery, stressed out, snappy, tired, nervous brat. I hope he understands. As it turns out, my stress was well-founded, as we discovered during our connection in Washington D.C.. From the scheduled landing time of our plane from Japan to the departure time of our plane to Detroit, we had two and a half hours. That's more than enough time, right? Nope. Instead of docking at a different gate like normal planes do when the assigned gate is occupied, our plane waited for half an hour. Then we finally got into the airport, and I had to separate from my boyfriend because I'm an American citizen and didn't have to go through immigration. After going though customs and getting my passport stamped, I went to the baggage claim and re-check area, which is the dumbest thing I have ever heard of in my life. I found my and my boyfriend's bags and sat with them, watching the door for him to arrive. After waiting a long time and starting to worry, a security woman told me that I couldn't wait in the baggage claim area. I told her politely that I was waiting for my boyfriend to go through immigration and that this was his first time traveling by plane and his English wasn't too great. I was worried that he would have a lot of trouble figuring out this step of the process, because I even had trouble with said ridiculousness. She responded very impolitely that I was in a baggage claim area, not a waiting room. I was under the impression that one could function as the other, seeing as it had never been a problem in domestic flights, and reiterated that my boyfriend was not American and had no idea what was going on. She, again impolitely, inquired his age, to which I replied 23. She then quite rudely reminded me in an unnecessarily raised voice that he is an adult and can take care of himself and I had better get my own self taken care of so that I don't cost the airline money by missing my flight. I held back tears of stress, anger, and helplessness and also restrained from using profanities. I did as she said, hatred for United Airlines building in my chest.
After making it through security, I took a look at the departures board and realized that we didn't have much time left before missing our flight. I asked the nice (no really, the guy was as helpful as he could be) information kiosk guy how far away our gate was and how long it usually took incoming flights to get through immigration. As it became evident that we would probably miss our flight unless I could get my boyfriend through some lines faster, I asked the kind guy if he could radio downstairs to get my boyfriend to the front of the line. I've experienced that in security often: people with flights really soon are ushered to the front of the line. This saves the airline money and unwanted customer dissatisfaction at missing a flight because of the airline. Well, turns out, the nice man wasn't even allowed to talk to security or immigrations people. Isn't a pillar of good customer service communication between employees? Now I was really mad at United Airlines. At long last, my boyfriend emerged through the doors, and I wiped my tears that had been streaming down my face at increasing intervals as the minutes passed because the next flight to Detroit was five hours later and we had already flown overseas and were on our second connection. I told him to run, and we ran to the terminal. We were five minutes late. The plane hadn't departed yet; the doors had closed. I asked if there was any way to get us on the plane before it left in five minutes, and the guy working there walked away talking into a radio without answering me. A couple of minutes later, during which minutes my boyfriend and I were waiting hopefully and breathlessly from running on nearby seats, an angry man who had been waiting at the wrong gate because that's where a United representative told him to wait came yelling at the gate guy who was still there (not the one who walked off with the radio). The guy told him that the doors had closed and he would have to wait for the next flight five hours later. I became livid and yelled something like, "you mean we've been waiting here for you to tell us if we can get on the plane or not and you were never gonna tell us that the answer is no?!?!" He made some cocky remark, but I was already in tears. After stressing out in now three airports in one day, after the stress of waiting helplessly with no way to contact my boyfriend for more than an hour, after being snapped at by now four United employees (including two snotty flight attendants), I had missed a flight for the first time in my life. It was totally out of my control and nobody had tried to help me.
We then waited for like an hour in a service counter line and although I had all these grand ideas about bitching out the service counter person, I realized that a lot of the people in line were on the same flight we were that waited too long outside the gate. I'm sure the service counter people had already been yelled at, and I just didn't have energy. So I switched our flight and called my mom on that phone because she was waiting to pick us up in Detroit, and I complained very loudly so that everyone could hear about how much I hated United because of the events of the past few hours. I suppose they were thinking similar thoughts. My mother was also thinking similar thoughts, because she had to drive over an hour back home and then drive back to the airport again later to come get us.
We ended up eating hamburgers and fries while waiting, and spending some relaxing time watching my boyfriend experience his first moments in America relaxed me a bit. After finally arriving at Detroit Metro, we had a little baggage confusion but nothing too bad, and had an awkwardly emotionless meeting with my mom. Everyone was exhausted and annoyed about the flight change, so after nine months in Korea the first moment I saw my mom had no tears or laughs. Those would come later, as will the next post.
The gist of this post is... NEVER FLY UNITED AIRLINES! To back up my point here is another person with a similarly angry outlook on United: United Breaks Guitars
After making it through security, I took a look at the departures board and realized that we didn't have much time left before missing our flight. I asked the nice (no really, the guy was as helpful as he could be) information kiosk guy how far away our gate was and how long it usually took incoming flights to get through immigration. As it became evident that we would probably miss our flight unless I could get my boyfriend through some lines faster, I asked the kind guy if he could radio downstairs to get my boyfriend to the front of the line. I've experienced that in security often: people with flights really soon are ushered to the front of the line. This saves the airline money and unwanted customer dissatisfaction at missing a flight because of the airline. Well, turns out, the nice man wasn't even allowed to talk to security or immigrations people. Isn't a pillar of good customer service communication between employees? Now I was really mad at United Airlines. At long last, my boyfriend emerged through the doors, and I wiped my tears that had been streaming down my face at increasing intervals as the minutes passed because the next flight to Detroit was five hours later and we had already flown overseas and were on our second connection. I told him to run, and we ran to the terminal. We were five minutes late. The plane hadn't departed yet; the doors had closed. I asked if there was any way to get us on the plane before it left in five minutes, and the guy working there walked away talking into a radio without answering me. A couple of minutes later, during which minutes my boyfriend and I were waiting hopefully and breathlessly from running on nearby seats, an angry man who had been waiting at the wrong gate because that's where a United representative told him to wait came yelling at the gate guy who was still there (not the one who walked off with the radio). The guy told him that the doors had closed and he would have to wait for the next flight five hours later. I became livid and yelled something like, "you mean we've been waiting here for you to tell us if we can get on the plane or not and you were never gonna tell us that the answer is no?!?!" He made some cocky remark, but I was already in tears. After stressing out in now three airports in one day, after the stress of waiting helplessly with no way to contact my boyfriend for more than an hour, after being snapped at by now four United employees (including two snotty flight attendants), I had missed a flight for the first time in my life. It was totally out of my control and nobody had tried to help me.
We then waited for like an hour in a service counter line and although I had all these grand ideas about bitching out the service counter person, I realized that a lot of the people in line were on the same flight we were that waited too long outside the gate. I'm sure the service counter people had already been yelled at, and I just didn't have energy. So I switched our flight and called my mom on that phone because she was waiting to pick us up in Detroit, and I complained very loudly so that everyone could hear about how much I hated United because of the events of the past few hours. I suppose they were thinking similar thoughts. My mother was also thinking similar thoughts, because she had to drive over an hour back home and then drive back to the airport again later to come get us.
We ended up eating hamburgers and fries while waiting, and spending some relaxing time watching my boyfriend experience his first moments in America relaxed me a bit. After finally arriving at Detroit Metro, we had a little baggage confusion but nothing too bad, and had an awkwardly emotionless meeting with my mom. Everyone was exhausted and annoyed about the flight change, so after nine months in Korea the first moment I saw my mom had no tears or laughs. Those would come later, as will the next post.
The gist of this post is... NEVER FLY UNITED AIRLINES! To back up my point here is another person with a similarly angry outlook on United: United Breaks Guitars
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Remember December?
At long last, I will elaborate on what I mentioned in the last entry.
As I mentioned in earlier entries, I really wanted to try dog meat once before coming back to America. I love controversy and culture and food, and here was one thing that encompassed all of those. My boyfriend's mother has, for years, enjoyed a good dog meat dinner once in a while, so when she heard that I wanted to try it she was kind of excited. Also, it's a well-known fact in Korea that foreigners don't eat dog. If you didn't catch this when I said it before, many Koreans also refuse to eat it on moral grounds. Anyway, we went to a dog meat restaurant, where my boyfriend's mother and I got spicy dog meat soup, and my boyfriend got a dog soup with a mild flavor. We also had a dish of dog skin, which made my skin crawl when I ate it because I don't even like chicken skin. In case you're wondering, dog meat has a lot of connective tissue, which makes it hard to chew, and the flavor is a little strange- definitely something I will not eat again by choice. Anyway, I'm glad I tried it because now I'm not wondering what it tastes like.
My boyfriend and I wanted to do a lot of traveling around Andong while we lived there, but it didn't really end up happening much. One day in December, we just got up and did it. We gathered his old watercolors and paper, bought some bread from a bakery and some convenience store snacks, and hopped on a bus to the countryside. Now I know it's taboo to cite Wikipedia, but whatever. What we saw was Korea's 15th national treasure, 봉정사 (Bongjeongsa). For more information about the architecture, look here. Anyway, it was really cold, but we had a lot of fun. We walked up a mountainside to get there, including a little rice farmer path my boyfriend's mom tipped us off about that got us around the entrance gate where you have to pay something like $3. We saw some women coming down from recreational mountain climbing while we were going up, so I guess it's an insider secret. After looking around, taking tons of pictures, and talking to some monks, we found a little pond my boyfriend remembered from a few years ago when he visited with his mom. We ate our bread and sat on a bench, freezing, and then painted the pond in watercolors while the sun set. Then we walked back down the mountainside in the dark and hopped on the bus back to civilization. It was a great, romantic, relaxing day. I recommend it for couples and families, but try to pick better weather. Autumn or spring would be best. I don't think that will be our last watercolor picnic in the countryside. :)
For my boyfriend's mother's birthday, we tried to do something simple that she would love. We went out a little before she got home to do some birthday shopping and trick her into thinking we forgot it was her birthday, and also because we woke up late. We bought a chocolate mousse cake and some persimmons, because she doesn't like sugary things like cake, but everyone loves blowing out the candles. She eats persimmons all the time- at least one per day. I, personally don't like them the way she does: she waits until they're soft and eats them with a spoon. But I did try something in Seoul I thought I mention. It was a hot milk and cinnamon tea with a slice of soft persimmon in the bottom. It's really delicious, really healthy especially if you don't use much sugar, and if you serve it at parties or with holiday dinners, it will be something your guests have never tasted before because persimmons aren't as common in America. Anyway, for the birthday party, we also bought some tortilla chips, which are an exotic foreign food in the international section of the grocery store. I introduced chips and salsa to my boyfriend and his family, and his mom likes to eat just the chips by themselves. Finally, we rented Mamma Mia, which she loves and listens to the soundtrack all the time. We all sat down to munchies and a movie for her birthday. All in all, a toned-down version of American birthday parties. Why toned down? Well, I'll tell you. Age in Korea is counted differently than in America. When a baby is born, it is one year old. Then, everyone turns one year older on the lunar ("Chinese") new year. That has two big effects (well, more than two but I won't talk about them): one, everyone is one or two years older in Korea; and, two, people don't turn older on their birthdays, making them less meaningful. Recently, the cake and candles and presents tradition is normal with some people, but it hasn't caught on in other circles.
Before coming back to America, I wanted to see all the people who were important to me, and my boyfriend did, too. We started with a day out with my friends from 울산 (Ulsan), 성동 (Sungdong) and Reza (from England, no Korean name to romanize). We went to 하회마을 (Hahoe Maeul, traditional village). It was, again, cold, so we didn't get to see it at its' prime, and we didn't see any dancing people with traditional costumes and masks. But we did see a guy who makes pottery, and he helped Reza make a coffee mug, which was cool. After that, we got pizza for dinner, and the boys went back home. It was nice to see them one last time in 2009.
The next day was a family party at our apartment. My boyfriend's aunts and uncle and cousins all came over. We made Christmas decorations from paper with the little girl cousin, who came early with her two friends to play games and eat snacks... basically so she could show off her chef cousin and his American girlfriend. I taught them how to make snickerdoodles, for which one of the aunts asked the recipe. We ate homemade spicy chicken, 삼겹살 (samgyeopsal, like bacon but thicker cut), pizza, fruit, and various alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages. I sat at the adult table and understood about half of the conversation! Yay~! It was exactly the same as my family gatherings in America, except in a different language and with different foods.
The day after that, we lugged three suitcases and some bags to Seoul via bus, where we transferred to the subway and made our way to my boyfriend's father's apartment. We were greeted with hellos and offers of food. My favorite. :) We crashed and woke up the next day to hang out with our friends in Seoul. We invited about ten people, and we ended up seeing my friend Julia, whom I met in Korean class at MSU last year and moved to Seoul over the summer. We went shopping, had dinner, and caught the subway home. Well, close to home. We bought some chicken, snacks, and sodas and went to my boyfriend's friend's apartment. He made even more food for us and we ate and talked into the night. After sleeping in the morning, we got up and went home to get ready to go to dinner with his father and little brother. We went to VIPs, a popular Western food buffet. The one we went to was a special all-you-can-eat ribs buffet, and we ate and ate and ate all we could eat. Let's just say we got our money's worth. Like the rest of my boyfriend's family, his father and brother like me. That's a good thing.
On December 24, we had a special couple day at Everland, the Korean equivalent of Disneyworld. We won a contest by telling our couple story, and won free entry, free cute mittens and a little red Christmas cape and reindeer antlers, a free special safari in a jeep (during which we fed lions and siberian tigers), free dinner, special reserved seats in the ferris wheel timed for us to see fireworks from the sky, and we were the key feature in a stage show just after sunset. It was amazing- a great last day in Korea before coming back to study.
Next time I'll tell you about our long plane ride, why I'll never fly United again, and our life in America up until now. I'm not stopping this blog just because I'm not in Korea anymore, because I think that both my reverse culture shock and my boyfriend's experiences are interesting and related to this blog. Anyway my fingers are tired. See ya~
As I mentioned in earlier entries, I really wanted to try dog meat once before coming back to America. I love controversy and culture and food, and here was one thing that encompassed all of those. My boyfriend's mother has, for years, enjoyed a good dog meat dinner once in a while, so when she heard that I wanted to try it she was kind of excited. Also, it's a well-known fact in Korea that foreigners don't eat dog. If you didn't catch this when I said it before, many Koreans also refuse to eat it on moral grounds. Anyway, we went to a dog meat restaurant, where my boyfriend's mother and I got spicy dog meat soup, and my boyfriend got a dog soup with a mild flavor. We also had a dish of dog skin, which made my skin crawl when I ate it because I don't even like chicken skin. In case you're wondering, dog meat has a lot of connective tissue, which makes it hard to chew, and the flavor is a little strange- definitely something I will not eat again by choice. Anyway, I'm glad I tried it because now I'm not wondering what it tastes like.
My boyfriend and I wanted to do a lot of traveling around Andong while we lived there, but it didn't really end up happening much. One day in December, we just got up and did it. We gathered his old watercolors and paper, bought some bread from a bakery and some convenience store snacks, and hopped on a bus to the countryside. Now I know it's taboo to cite Wikipedia, but whatever. What we saw was Korea's 15th national treasure, 봉정사 (Bongjeongsa). For more information about the architecture, look here. Anyway, it was really cold, but we had a lot of fun. We walked up a mountainside to get there, including a little rice farmer path my boyfriend's mom tipped us off about that got us around the entrance gate where you have to pay something like $3. We saw some women coming down from recreational mountain climbing while we were going up, so I guess it's an insider secret. After looking around, taking tons of pictures, and talking to some monks, we found a little pond my boyfriend remembered from a few years ago when he visited with his mom. We ate our bread and sat on a bench, freezing, and then painted the pond in watercolors while the sun set. Then we walked back down the mountainside in the dark and hopped on the bus back to civilization. It was a great, romantic, relaxing day. I recommend it for couples and families, but try to pick better weather. Autumn or spring would be best. I don't think that will be our last watercolor picnic in the countryside. :)
For my boyfriend's mother's birthday, we tried to do something simple that she would love. We went out a little before she got home to do some birthday shopping and trick her into thinking we forgot it was her birthday, and also because we woke up late. We bought a chocolate mousse cake and some persimmons, because she doesn't like sugary things like cake, but everyone loves blowing out the candles. She eats persimmons all the time- at least one per day. I, personally don't like them the way she does: she waits until they're soft and eats them with a spoon. But I did try something in Seoul I thought I mention. It was a hot milk and cinnamon tea with a slice of soft persimmon in the bottom. It's really delicious, really healthy especially if you don't use much sugar, and if you serve it at parties or with holiday dinners, it will be something your guests have never tasted before because persimmons aren't as common in America. Anyway, for the birthday party, we also bought some tortilla chips, which are an exotic foreign food in the international section of the grocery store. I introduced chips and salsa to my boyfriend and his family, and his mom likes to eat just the chips by themselves. Finally, we rented Mamma Mia, which she loves and listens to the soundtrack all the time. We all sat down to munchies and a movie for her birthday. All in all, a toned-down version of American birthday parties. Why toned down? Well, I'll tell you. Age in Korea is counted differently than in America. When a baby is born, it is one year old. Then, everyone turns one year older on the lunar ("Chinese") new year. That has two big effects (well, more than two but I won't talk about them): one, everyone is one or two years older in Korea; and, two, people don't turn older on their birthdays, making them less meaningful. Recently, the cake and candles and presents tradition is normal with some people, but it hasn't caught on in other circles.
Before coming back to America, I wanted to see all the people who were important to me, and my boyfriend did, too. We started with a day out with my friends from 울산 (Ulsan), 성동 (Sungdong) and Reza (from England, no Korean name to romanize). We went to 하회마을 (Hahoe Maeul, traditional village). It was, again, cold, so we didn't get to see it at its' prime, and we didn't see any dancing people with traditional costumes and masks. But we did see a guy who makes pottery, and he helped Reza make a coffee mug, which was cool. After that, we got pizza for dinner, and the boys went back home. It was nice to see them one last time in 2009.
The next day was a family party at our apartment. My boyfriend's aunts and uncle and cousins all came over. We made Christmas decorations from paper with the little girl cousin, who came early with her two friends to play games and eat snacks... basically so she could show off her chef cousin and his American girlfriend. I taught them how to make snickerdoodles, for which one of the aunts asked the recipe. We ate homemade spicy chicken, 삼겹살 (samgyeopsal, like bacon but thicker cut), pizza, fruit, and various alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages. I sat at the adult table and understood about half of the conversation! Yay~! It was exactly the same as my family gatherings in America, except in a different language and with different foods.
The day after that, we lugged three suitcases and some bags to Seoul via bus, where we transferred to the subway and made our way to my boyfriend's father's apartment. We were greeted with hellos and offers of food. My favorite. :) We crashed and woke up the next day to hang out with our friends in Seoul. We invited about ten people, and we ended up seeing my friend Julia, whom I met in Korean class at MSU last year and moved to Seoul over the summer. We went shopping, had dinner, and caught the subway home. Well, close to home. We bought some chicken, snacks, and sodas and went to my boyfriend's friend's apartment. He made even more food for us and we ate and talked into the night. After sleeping in the morning, we got up and went home to get ready to go to dinner with his father and little brother. We went to VIPs, a popular Western food buffet. The one we went to was a special all-you-can-eat ribs buffet, and we ate and ate and ate all we could eat. Let's just say we got our money's worth. Like the rest of my boyfriend's family, his father and brother like me. That's a good thing.
On December 24, we had a special couple day at Everland, the Korean equivalent of Disneyworld. We won a contest by telling our couple story, and won free entry, free cute mittens and a little red Christmas cape and reindeer antlers, a free special safari in a jeep (during which we fed lions and siberian tigers), free dinner, special reserved seats in the ferris wheel timed for us to see fireworks from the sky, and we were the key feature in a stage show just after sunset. It was amazing- a great last day in Korea before coming back to study.
Next time I'll tell you about our long plane ride, why I'll never fly United again, and our life in America up until now. I'm not stopping this blog just because I'm not in Korea anymore, because I think that both my reverse culture shock and my boyfriend's experiences are interesting and related to this blog. Anyway my fingers are tired. See ya~
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Merry Christmas!!!
A lot has happened in the last moneth, although Andong life is slow. I'll write notes here for myself to remember later and to give you a taste of what's to come, and later I'll write in more detail.
My boyfriend, his mother, and I went out to eat dog meat and go sing karaoke (노래방).
My boyfriend and I went on a watercolor picnic date to one of Korea's 15 national treasures.
We threw a little birthday party for his mother.
We had a party at his mother's apartment with his aunts, his uncle, and his cousins (all younger).
We packed up and came back to Seoul to stay with his father for a few days before leaving for America together.
We saw some of our friends for the last time before going to America.
Today we ate at VIPs, a popular buffet restaurant, with his father and little brother until we were so full we felt like we would surely die.
Tomorrow we will go to Everland (Korea's Disneyland) and reap the benefits of winning a couple contest: free entry, free private safari, free special dinner, free special seats for fireworks, free git set, etc.. Because our couple story is so special, we will be featured Christmas Day in one of Korea's most famous newspapers, and maybe also on TV.
Christmas Day, we're heading to America together~ almost home! I must admit I'm pretty homesick.
That's December. More details later. Intrigued?
My boyfriend, his mother, and I went out to eat dog meat and go sing karaoke (노래방).
My boyfriend and I went on a watercolor picnic date to one of Korea's 15 national treasures.
We threw a little birthday party for his mother.
We had a party at his mother's apartment with his aunts, his uncle, and his cousins (all younger).
We packed up and came back to Seoul to stay with his father for a few days before leaving for America together.
We saw some of our friends for the last time before going to America.
Today we ate at VIPs, a popular buffet restaurant, with his father and little brother until we were so full we felt like we would surely die.
Tomorrow we will go to Everland (Korea's Disneyland) and reap the benefits of winning a couple contest: free entry, free private safari, free special dinner, free special seats for fireworks, free git set, etc.. Because our couple story is so special, we will be featured Christmas Day in one of Korea's most famous newspapers, and maybe also on TV.
Christmas Day, we're heading to America together~ almost home! I must admit I'm pretty homesick.
That's December. More details later. Intrigued?
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Thanksgiving Day
As most of you probably know, Thanksgiving is coming up in one day (for me) or two days (in America). Try explaining to Koreans that Thanksgiving is always on a Thursday so there's no real day of the year they can mark on their calendars. Also, in America we have the Easter four: Fat Tuesday, Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday. I don't even know how those are decided. Not to mention our Monday holidays which very few people actually celebrate. What ever happened to normal holidays like Christmas, which is December 25th every year. Or, better yet, holidays like the 4th of July and Cinco de Mayo, which tell you the day in their very names! Anyway, confusing as it may be, it's Thanksgiving time and I didn't realize it until I saw it on my Facebook news feed. I don't know how I remembered any holidays, especially birthdays, before Facebook.
Anyway.... since my parents divorced about ten years ago, my family holidays have been a muddled mess of calendar days regardless of the confusing nature of day-of-the-week-based holidays. So, I don't really consider the day itself as important as the people and the activities that go along with it. So, if I have five Christmases on five different days like I did once two or three years ago, that's totally fine with me. Plus, for me, Thanksgiving has never been a huge deal, so not celebrating it is also fine with me. It's just... strange not to have everyone else around me celebrating it. It's strange to have the urge to draw an elaborate hand turkey and show it off to... all the people who have no idea what it means. For me, tryptophan, mashed potatoes, and pumpkin or rhubarb pie after a long day of watching older family members cook and playing with cousins and/or my brother makes my mouth water and my heart pang. Remember when dressing up like a pilgrim was a drag and dressing up like an Indian made you a cool kid for the day? Remember when hand turkeys were sacred expressions of individuality rather than cute, silly things? Growing older, remember when you first got to drink wine or champagne at dinner for Thanksgiving, Christmas, or New Year's Eve? Even though most of us hated it, we pretended to like it because it was oh-so-forbidden. I spent one Thanksgiving with my best friend's family in high school, and there were so many people there and so much delicious food. She and I set the table and helped out with a couple other things, and I felt so useful and needed and like I was part of something special- something that only happens once a year. Last year, my roommate and I invited my mother and brother, and some of my English students (international students studying at our university) to our apartment and hosted a traditional Thanksgiving dinner. I want to do that type of thing here, but I don't really know how to cook the food in the tiny gas-fire oven with approximate temperature in Celsius, and I wouldn't know where to buy it in the first place. Plus, I'm sure most is expensive. Maybe next year or the year after that I'll try.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, have a happy Thanksgiving, all you Americans. I really miss it. Not celebrating Easter or Independence Day was okay, but now I'm really missing the food holiday. Whether you realize it or not, food is one of the most important aspects of culture. Every (excuse the possibly inaccurate generalization) society in the world has rituals surrounding the consumption of food, including table manners, distribution of responsibility, and even restaurant manners are different. For instance, in Korea, one must call the waiter or push a call button for service. In America, waiters come to the table periodically and it's embarrassing to call one. Also, most importantly, what we like to eat is largely culture-based. In Korea, more than half of the food contains red pepper (the spicy one, not bell pepper) powder, paste, and/or peppers themselves. Most Koreans don't feel like they are eating if they don't have kimchi and rice, and prefer to have more choices of side dishes as well. In America, side dishes are included on the same plate as the main dish, because the utensil you eat with must not touch food other people might eat. There are separate serving utensils. Your food is all together on one plate, but it is seen as barbarian to mix it together. In Korea, you usually only need chopsticks and spoons, and everyone has a small dish on which to combine ingredients (like lettuce, pork, and kimchi) or to let food cool, or to avoid spilling soup on the table. So, your spoon or chopsticks make a line from the shared dish in the middle of the table to your dish (or just above it) to your mouth. Every type of food is served on a different dish. Therefore, if you are served a dish consisting of separate parts, you mix them all together before eating so it's all one dish. For instance, bibimbap, one of the most popular Korean foods in the world. It's basically rice, some vegetables, beef, and a fried egg stacked in a bowl. You add red pepper paste and mix it together before eating with a spoon. If you use chopsticks to pick out each piece separately, you are quite strange indeed. Another point about food is that culture also determines (mostly) what we are willing to eat. Yes, most of us like kung pao chicken and fortune cookies, but have you ever tasted real Chinese food? Some menu items include bugs or parts of animals Americans never thought of as edible. Even here in Korea, dog meat was traditionally eaten, and is still available. Many younger people refuse to eat it on moral principle, and others only eat it on special occasions on which dog meat is the required traditional food. But, if you think about it, how is eating a dog any different from eating a pig? Pigs are smart, clean, and make great, family friendly pets. The reason pigs that live outside roll in the mud is that they don't sweat, so they use the mud to act as sweat, allowing their body heat to escape by transferring to the evaporating water. They don't have tusks like elephants do to splash water on themselves. Anyway, dogs weren't usually pets in Korea before Western influence incited their popularity. I intend to try dog meat because I'm curious, just like I've tried almost every other food offered to me here. It's not a moral thing, it's just food. And no, Koreans aren't going to eat your dog, just like you wouldn't eat your neighbor's pet pig, chicken, cow, deer, fish, etc.. That's just xenophobic thinking.
It's interesting that an American with a Hyundai car and an LG cell phone and a Samsung TV could think that a Korean would eat their dog. Before I moved here, people asked me if there were cars in Korea, or if I was going to North or South Korea, or what language people speak in Korea. Funny to think that a few years ago, I didn't know anything about Korea either. What an oddly inspirational country!
A few years ago, I would be eagerly awaiting a week of Thanksgiving leftovers. I wonder what I'll have for dinner tomorrow.... I wonder if I can even buy turkey for a reasonable price here.....
Anyway.... since my parents divorced about ten years ago, my family holidays have been a muddled mess of calendar days regardless of the confusing nature of day-of-the-week-based holidays. So, I don't really consider the day itself as important as the people and the activities that go along with it. So, if I have five Christmases on five different days like I did once two or three years ago, that's totally fine with me. Plus, for me, Thanksgiving has never been a huge deal, so not celebrating it is also fine with me. It's just... strange not to have everyone else around me celebrating it. It's strange to have the urge to draw an elaborate hand turkey and show it off to... all the people who have no idea what it means. For me, tryptophan, mashed potatoes, and pumpkin or rhubarb pie after a long day of watching older family members cook and playing with cousins and/or my brother makes my mouth water and my heart pang. Remember when dressing up like a pilgrim was a drag and dressing up like an Indian made you a cool kid for the day? Remember when hand turkeys were sacred expressions of individuality rather than cute, silly things? Growing older, remember when you first got to drink wine or champagne at dinner for Thanksgiving, Christmas, or New Year's Eve? Even though most of us hated it, we pretended to like it because it was oh-so-forbidden. I spent one Thanksgiving with my best friend's family in high school, and there were so many people there and so much delicious food. She and I set the table and helped out with a couple other things, and I felt so useful and needed and like I was part of something special- something that only happens once a year. Last year, my roommate and I invited my mother and brother, and some of my English students (international students studying at our university) to our apartment and hosted a traditional Thanksgiving dinner. I want to do that type of thing here, but I don't really know how to cook the food in the tiny gas-fire oven with approximate temperature in Celsius, and I wouldn't know where to buy it in the first place. Plus, I'm sure most is expensive. Maybe next year or the year after that I'll try.
I guess what I'm trying to say is, have a happy Thanksgiving, all you Americans. I really miss it. Not celebrating Easter or Independence Day was okay, but now I'm really missing the food holiday. Whether you realize it or not, food is one of the most important aspects of culture. Every (excuse the possibly inaccurate generalization) society in the world has rituals surrounding the consumption of food, including table manners, distribution of responsibility, and even restaurant manners are different. For instance, in Korea, one must call the waiter or push a call button for service. In America, waiters come to the table periodically and it's embarrassing to call one. Also, most importantly, what we like to eat is largely culture-based. In Korea, more than half of the food contains red pepper (the spicy one, not bell pepper) powder, paste, and/or peppers themselves. Most Koreans don't feel like they are eating if they don't have kimchi and rice, and prefer to have more choices of side dishes as well. In America, side dishes are included on the same plate as the main dish, because the utensil you eat with must not touch food other people might eat. There are separate serving utensils. Your food is all together on one plate, but it is seen as barbarian to mix it together. In Korea, you usually only need chopsticks and spoons, and everyone has a small dish on which to combine ingredients (like lettuce, pork, and kimchi) or to let food cool, or to avoid spilling soup on the table. So, your spoon or chopsticks make a line from the shared dish in the middle of the table to your dish (or just above it) to your mouth. Every type of food is served on a different dish. Therefore, if you are served a dish consisting of separate parts, you mix them all together before eating so it's all one dish. For instance, bibimbap, one of the most popular Korean foods in the world. It's basically rice, some vegetables, beef, and a fried egg stacked in a bowl. You add red pepper paste and mix it together before eating with a spoon. If you use chopsticks to pick out each piece separately, you are quite strange indeed. Another point about food is that culture also determines (mostly) what we are willing to eat. Yes, most of us like kung pao chicken and fortune cookies, but have you ever tasted real Chinese food? Some menu items include bugs or parts of animals Americans never thought of as edible. Even here in Korea, dog meat was traditionally eaten, and is still available. Many younger people refuse to eat it on moral principle, and others only eat it on special occasions on which dog meat is the required traditional food. But, if you think about it, how is eating a dog any different from eating a pig? Pigs are smart, clean, and make great, family friendly pets. The reason pigs that live outside roll in the mud is that they don't sweat, so they use the mud to act as sweat, allowing their body heat to escape by transferring to the evaporating water. They don't have tusks like elephants do to splash water on themselves. Anyway, dogs weren't usually pets in Korea before Western influence incited their popularity. I intend to try dog meat because I'm curious, just like I've tried almost every other food offered to me here. It's not a moral thing, it's just food. And no, Koreans aren't going to eat your dog, just like you wouldn't eat your neighbor's pet pig, chicken, cow, deer, fish, etc.. That's just xenophobic thinking.
It's interesting that an American with a Hyundai car and an LG cell phone and a Samsung TV could think that a Korean would eat their dog. Before I moved here, people asked me if there were cars in Korea, or if I was going to North or South Korea, or what language people speak in Korea. Funny to think that a few years ago, I didn't know anything about Korea either. What an oddly inspirational country!
A few years ago, I would be eagerly awaiting a week of Thanksgiving leftovers. I wonder what I'll have for dinner tomorrow.... I wonder if I can even buy turkey for a reasonable price here.....
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