EXPLORING

I’ve been in Korea for a month. People here are sweet, shy, sensitive folks who ask the obvious questions. They want to know how you like their country and, do you like Kimchi. The only appropriate answer for the first question is, “I like Korea very much.” whether you do or not. As for the second, most westerners don’t care for kimchi. It’s a pungent tasting, cabbage wanna-be; to Korean cuisine what a side salad is to American. It comes with every meal. 

So I don’t have to deceive anybody, I do like Korea but I like every place. So it’s not a powerful, sweeping approval of the total culture but I do like it here. If I had to stay here for a long time, I’d have to work on my attitude and realign my expectations but I could handle it gracefully. When I first went to Alaska, natives wanted to know what I thought of their mountains. I said they were great but my approval didn’t satisfy Alaskan egos. They wanted me to go on and on about the awesome grandeur. I had to make a disclaimer; “You have to understand, I’ve been to Patagonia, the Andes, before I came to Alaska.”  Sometimes “Great” is the best you can do. Korea is great, and that’s as good as I can do. The kimchi is fine as well. I can take it or leave it; usually eat some as it is good practice with chop sticks. 

A lot of this journey is reminiscent of Chile and Argentina, in 2005. I do lots of walking, an obvious outsider; surrounded by people and traffic that move in concert with each other but totally out of sync with my sensibility. Store fronts are awash with advertising; bold banners with bright colors, all a mystery to me. I have figured out the ones with percentage discounts. All of the residential neighborhoods are high rise buildings, 15 - 20 floors, shoulder to shoulder in long rows that stretch out of sight. Down along the street are mostly restaurants, coffee shops and cell phone outlets. One of my favorite stores is the Korean answer to “Dollar General.” Its name is “Daiso,” with everything from cosmetics to kitchen utensils, toys, school supplies, even underwear. I got my own set of chop sticks. In Korea, they approved the spoon, so you don’t have to sip soup from the bowl or eat rice with the sticks. But their chop sticks are made of stainless steel and they are heavy, difficult for beginners to manipulate. My own, personal, bamboo sticks are shorter, lighter and much easier to operate. I practice with pop corn or by transferring M&M’s from one bowl to another. 

Sometimes you can’t see inside the restaurant because the windows are covered with posters of menu selections. I’m a notoriously picky eater and haven’t been very adventurous there. Places that serve sea food often have live tanks outside, where you can see, even pick your critter before it’s cleaned and cooked for you. I’m used to seeing catfish and lobster tanks but the squid and octopus were new to me. Need to remember the squid drive around in reverse so when they bump into the glass, they’re not beating their heads agains the wall. Just the same, their fates are pretty much sealed. 

I walk until I’ve seen enough, then look for a bakery. The bakeries in Chile and Argentina were my mainstay. If not for those tasty empañadas, I would have dried up and wasted away. Here they like a lot of cinnamon and sugar, which I can live with. Not as healthy as the empañadas but when in Rome. . .