A few tidbits

So nothing spectacular has been going on, but I really wanted to do an update so I just compiled a few things that I've been doing during the last week or so.

First things first. FOOD. Hahahah. Haven't had a food post in a while, right? The first one is 피자 닭갈비, aka Pizza Chicken Meat or AWESOME. Hahah. So I love 닭갈비 (basically spicy boneless dark meat pieces of chicken with veggies), but we wanted a little twist, so we went to a place that has pizza-style. So this one also had mozzarella cheese, olives, bell peppers and onions sprinkled on top. So good. 

We cleaned it up. Hahahah. 

Then tonight, my familia had dinner @ Cafe Minto to celebrate the end of the semester . Seven girls ate two bowls of pasta, three bowls of 떡복기, which is like spicy rice cakes. So delicious. 

Been going to church, too, and seeing too many people dress alike. 

We also take sticker pictures and make Chung wear ridiculous headbands.

Emmaus Girlies :):):)

And.. we also study :D. Melissa, Ashley and my favorite place to study is @ Princeton Square. The environment is so conducive to studying. Work work work!

AND CHECK IT OUT! They have a USC Banner! Fight on!

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A President's Funeral

So the day I went to the restaurant (see previous post) was FRIDAY, the 29th. It was also the day of the funeral for former South Korean president Roh Moo-hyun. Read about his death here. But if you want the gist of it. 

Roh was under investigation for bribery charges during his presidency, which was from 2002-2007. He was questioned by prosecutors and committed suicide a few days later by jumping off a cliff while hiking near his retirement home. It was shocking for the whole nation. 

And it also showed me how insane this nation is. All day, every day, they showed pictures of former President Roh and people mourning his death. People crying, more people crying, even more people crying. And it wouldn't be so weird if it wasn't for how they had treated this guy before. He had such a low approval rating when he was president, and after. People hated him. They protested his rule like crazy. He was even impeached. Then when he died, the pendulum swung the other way. People who thought he was a traitor by possibly accepting bribes, now thought he was a hero and did the honorable thing. READ THIS ANALYSIS BY THE NEW YORK TIMES HERE. 

So later that night, after most of the official festivities were done, my dad decided to take my family to the place where they were held to see if anything else was still going on. And it definitely was. 

There were tons and tons of people EVERYWHERE. Holding candles, crying, murmuring quietly, etc. 

A Korean custom in Korea, to bow to the picture of the deceased.

There were so many people lining up to bow to this one. I guess it was the "official" one? Or the one everyone wanted to bow at. It was INSANE. 

We went around 9:45, 10 p.m., and there were so many people. They blocked off the street in this major intersection in the city so people could sit around. There were people sitting in circles, talking and/or listening to people speaking into a giant speaker system. The speechgivers were talking about the ex-president and how he was awesome and how horrible the current administration is. There were a lot of very left-wing people out there. 

More people sitting. 

Left-wing propaganda, telling people to impeach/hate the current president. 

People sitting around. 

And like any good Korean political gathering, there were plenty of riot police around. There was actually a march and shots were fired into the air. I'm pretty sure they weren't bullets, but man it's pretty scary to have a bunch of Korean people run like a mob towards you. Wish I got that on video...

Eventually the police turned on these giant lights to blind people and/or to tell people to calm down. 

The face of former President Roh. His party's color was yellow. May he rest in peace. 

Food Adventure with Family!

Best part about hanging out with my parents? Well, I guess it's actually the second best because the first best is being able to be with my parents. So the second best is... EATING!!!! 

We met up with my mom's friends family and we went to this delicious restaurant in 홍대 or Hongdae, named after the arts university in the area. It's got a lot of cute places to eat and so we went to one called 어머니가 차려주는 식탁 or The Table that Mother Prepares [for you to eat]. YAY! 

Super cute, yeah?

Basically it's a lot of traditional Korean foods with modern twists. It came out in about 10 courses. I didn't upload pictures of all of them — I just put up my favorites. But wow, I was so SO full by the end. 

Delicious salad with tofu slices and an (edible) peony on top. 

This one was super interesting. The folded green and white slices are thinly sliced pieces of rice cake, kind of like the rice paper they give you at all-you-can-eat Korean BBQ restaurants but thicker and slightly tougher. Take a slice (using chopsticks of course) and then take some of the salad and place it in the middle of the rice paper slice. Then wrap it, dip it in the sweet sauce, and mmm. So good. 

This is the modern twist of the 삼겹살, or the Korean equivalent of bacon, but way better because it's fattier. It was so good. It was so soft and tender and greasy. It was on top of this delicious salad and if you ate it together it was the perfect combination of meat and veggies. 

Isn't the presentation of this one awesome? Look at the heart! 

The food looks like fried stuff, and yes it is, but it's not your typical tempura. Inside the one that looks like shrimp is actually ginseng. I thought it would taste so weird, but it was actually quite good. And the other fried food is two slices of eggplant, held together with mashed shrimp. Yummmm. 

Then this is your typical 갈비, or Korean meat, right? WRONG. It's the most tender, best marinated meat ever. And to "heat" it, they lit it on fire. Yes. FIRE. And yes it's sitting on top of rocks and spruced with some kind of pine leaf or whatever. 

To finish the meal, we have greens mixed with rice and spicy sauce. I was about to die by this time because my stomach was so full. 

To finish it off, a nice cup of coffee, plus watermelons+oranges in the background.

So that was another entry. No pictures of me, but y'all are more interested in the food anyway, right? Wow I'm hungry. More updates soon :)

Dates with Girls :)

Korea has a lot of cute cafes and eateries. I love going to them and eating good food and getting cute desserts. Here's two places that I went to. The first one is Spoon Race. I went there once with Joanna before, but I went to it again with Melissa and Ashley. It's located in a small side street by Ewha Women's University. The place is ALWAYS packed. 

Waiting for our food. 

We ate all of it. Hahahahahah. But lemme tell ya, it was reaaaally good. 

I kid I kid. Here are a few pics. of what we demolished. 

Shrimp Olive Oil Pasta. Very light, very delicious. 

Gorgonzola & Honey Pizza Dish. 

You dip the pizza slices in the honey. So good. 

Dessert of Waffles, courtesy of Red Mango.

Tuesday (the 5th) was Children's Day, which is a national holiday = NO SCHOOL. So Tina, Joanna and I went to 압구정, which is a very upper-class section of Seoul. We walked around, browsed, and eventually found ourselves at Kaffee Strasse. 

This is Tina striking the Tina pose. We all followed suit. 

Our coffee + desserts! Yum yum!

More posts coming soon :)

B to the I to the BANG BANG

So after church today, a bunch of us went to go watch a Big Bang performance. If you don't know, Big Bang is a popular boy band in Korea. Their most popular song to date is 거짓말 or Lies. Check out the music video here. Another really famous one is 마지막 인사 or Last Farewell. Music video here.

So it wasn't a Big Bang concert, but more like they were part of a Hite (Korean beer) sponsorship event. It was cold, a little drizzly, and COLD. But whatever. First we had to sit through a Nanta performance and then a breakdancing performance. THEN came Big Bang. WOO!

Here are people waiting for the concert to start. 

One of the Big Bang members singing a song. 

The band!

Close-up, minus one member. 

It was really fun. They sang 4 songs, all of which I knew, which was awesome. The screaming junior high girls were the best, though. They are so intense. It was definitely an interesting experience and I'm glad I went. That is all! A new week of school starts tomorrow. Am I ready? We'll see...

Long day.

Hello :) Today I had a long but fun day. I met up with Noah (Noers) and we had adventures! First we went out to eat 순두부 (soondubu), which is like... tofu soup. 

Then we walked around the city hall area of Seoul. And for some reason, there were tons of police in riot gear, even though there were obviously no protesters around. There were a million of them, just standing (or sitting) in orderly rows.

Now that I think about it, maybe they were prepping for future rallies/protests. Today (since it's March 1 here) is 3·1운동, which is the anniversary of this nonviolent demonstration that took place on March 1, 1919, where Korea tried to declare its independence from Japanese colonial rule. It didn't turn out so well and a lot of people were arrested, torture, and killed at this event and in subsequent protests. Read more here.

I'm guessing that a lot of political stuff is going to happen tomorrow, so the cops are practicing how to react to crowds. 

Afterwards, we went to Cheonggyecheon, which is a stream that flows through Seoul. There's a walkway that lets you walk on either side of the stream. It's very peaceful and I bet it's gorgeous during the spring time, so I definitely plan to go back. It's a necessary change from the urban grey and the hustle and bustle of the city. 

People filming some Korean drama.

That's all for now. Bye :)

I love the subway.

I'm sure you've all heard of the terrible driving that takes place in Korea. And trust me, it's pretty bad. Cars cutting each other off with inches to spare, making completely illegal U-turns, parking where there really isn't a spot, more cutting off with inches to spare, etc. But they're surprisingly good parkers. 

Every time you go into a parking lot, you notice that they always park head out. It's never (well, rarely), head in. They always back into a spot. I'm guessing it's so that they can get out more quickly and because then you can see if a car is whizzing around the corner and about to hit you as you pull out. Very interesting. 

I went to a Home Plus for the first time. Think a really compact department store for cheap, like a Wal-Mart. 

Korea does not have Wal-Mart. Because Wal-Mart pulled out. That's right. Korea defeated Wal-Mart (Click here for a NY Times story). My cousin's husband explained to me that Wal-Mart didn't connect with Korean shoppers. They had a sprawling store with high ceilings, sort of in the American style, but Koreans didn't like it. They prefer the compact, multi-layered store. But yeah. Koreans are tough to please, apparently. 

On Sunday, after church, we went to Lotte Department Store again. Now last time I told you it was this gigantic department store. It's also attached to a giant hotel. And it has its own amusement park inside. And it has something I didn't know existed until yesterday — a folk museum. Not like an art gallery. But like a museum with replicas of buildings. What the heck. And inside the "museum," there are restaurants. Not a restaurant. Plural. So we ate at one of these.

This was my lunch. Rice, veggies, and spicy squid. SO SPICY. SO GOOD. I love that stuff. 

This was my dessert. I don't know how to explain it. It's like hardened sugar, but not crumbly. It's like hardened caramel but not chewy either. 

This is part of one of the replicas. Cool lighting, eh?

Me and Hyunjoo in front of a store replica. 

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Eventually I went out on my own to try to find this other church, so I took the subway for the first time since I got here. Man, last time I went out less than an hour after I moved into my dorm, but this time it took me 4 days. This is the Seoungnae subway station. It's one of the rare outdoor ones.

So I never actually found the church (long story), but it was fun walking around for 45 minutes around small stores, apartment buildings, 5 other churches, and tons of schools. So I'll end this entry here. Miss you guys!