Category Archives: Strange Customs

Awesomely unique things we’ve seen and done on our trip.

Guy Goes All Teddy Bear

11 Sunday Sep 2011

Posted by in Strange Customs

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Imagine for a minute a room full of multi-colored helium balloons, trays of food the size of small cars, teddy bears large and small covering every surface of table and floor space,  and more than a dozen happily combusting 6 year olds.  And their mothers.  Doesn’t that sound like Guy’s cup of tea? 

Sadly for him, I had no choice but to go to Costco that afternoon, as I needed ingredients for a dish I was making with my cooking class.  He was stuck with the task of taking Natalie to her first birthday party – Korean style.  I wish I could tell you all about it, but I think it best if he does it himself.  So, enjoy. 

Hello to all of you in blogland.  I won’t attempt to write in a style that compares to Vicki.  She’s good…I’m a hack.  So there I was stuck in TeddyBear Land on the 3rd floor of the nearby mall.  The photos will give you an idea of how it’s was a deranged cross between Chuck E. Cheese’s and Romper Room.  If you’re 6, I suppose it was several thousand square feet of padded, bouncy bliss.  The moms smiled a lot and gestured for me to eat, sit, drink, etc.  But I couldn’t shake that feeling of  “what is he doing here?”  That Sesame Street song kept playing in my head…”one of these things is not like the other…”  Natalie, needless to say, did not have the same experience.  She was completely at home running, jumping, laughing, and insisting that I take pictures of her and all her classmates.  That (the photos) ended up being a nice ice-breaker with the moms.  I’d go out amongst the screaming masses and report back to the um-mas with digital proof that a good time was being had by all.  At one point, one of the moms said to me, “I think you are bored.”    Not knowing what to say…I went and took more pictures.  Pulling balloons off the ceiling for the kids also validated my reason for being at this party.  What would the um-mas have done without me?

In the end, a good time was had by all…even me.  I’ve told students and my own kids that people generally learn best when they are just a bit uncomfortable.  We, the birthday boy’s mom and I, traded some mutually awkward words…for her it was “See you later” and for me it was “kan-sam-nee-dah” (thank you) and “ban-gap-seum-nee-dah” (nice to meet you.)  I’ll be ready for the next party…camera, Korean phrasebook, lots of nodding, and a big, goofy American smile.

 

Here’s the birthday boy with the ladies!

 

 

Purple is the New Black

09 Friday Sep 2011

Posted by in Common Sense, Out in the Big World/Travel, Strange Customs

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I have a little crush on the cab driver who brought me home from the hospital today.  When I got in his car, I couldn’t help but notice his pimp daddy purple shirt, his white driving gloves, his dapper pinstriped pants and his barely there grey at his temples.  I handed him the only business card I have with my address on it, which was from our principal, Gary Odom. 

“Do you know Bong-mu Dong?” I asked.  Usually this question receives a “ney (yes)” or a gruntish response, but not today.  Not from my dapper daddy.  “Yes, I know it well” he said.  You know it well? I thought.  I think I love you.  Hearing English when I’d just spent a frantic hour trying to navigate the Korean emergency room for Luke’s wrist (which is not broken, thank goodness), was like retreating to the walk-in cooler in the hell-hot kitchen of a restaurant.  Just for a second. 

Then, as we pulled away and our chat continued, he asked, in much more broken words “How big here Korea?” – he wanted to know how long I’d been here – and no matter how I tried, for the next few miles, my answers were too hard for him to translate.  We struggled, and laughed a little, until both of us got a little tired, of straining to simplify and still not being understood.  Plus I get wicked car sick in the stop/start of the city traffic.   “Card again?” he asked me when he stopped at a red light.  I gave it to him.  “Oh, Gary Odom,” he smiled kindly, “You do good. You good principal, yes?”  And then there was that split second, between when I knew I should have tried to correct him (god knows Gary deserved that) and when I decided not to, that I felt so at home with Mr. Purple shirt.   It was something in his kindness that made me think of home.   Yes, I decided to answer – I knew he’d be happy just to get something in the conversation right, yes, I am.  I’m a good Gary Odom principal.  Only I didn’t, I just smiled back. 

He brought me home, the long way, but I forgive him, and when I got out of the car he said ” goodnight, new friend!”   I mean, really.  He just made the whole kooky day a little less scary and a lot more friendly.  A small town heart in a gigantic city.  Don’t you love my Pimp Dapper Daddy too?

 

NOT For Young Readers!

27 Saturday Aug 2011

Posted by in Cuisine, Strange Customs

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The public buses run every 10-15 minutes or so, different numbers for different destinations, of course.  Today we hopped on the 401, headed for a “food celebration of some kind” according to the local coffee shop owner’s estimation.  Nick, a Canadian, has lived in Korea for 15 years and has had his wonderful little shop for 18 months.  I had the most delectable iced cafe au lait, a significant detour from the instant coffee I’ve been enjoying (really, quite good also!)

In true ‘adventure’ fashion, we missed our stop (because no one was getting on there and we didn’t move fast enough or know how to say “stop, please!”) This ended up being awesome, because we got to walk along the riverbanks, which was gorgeous.  We discovered a newly constructed walking bridge to get us to the side of the river where, in the distance, we could see 10-12 white tents and gigantic floating multi-colored balloons, clearly, the festival!

As we neared the site, it became clear that it was more like 80-100 small vendor tents, with every kind of delicious food you would want, as well as some you may not, and a huge stage with enormous speakers set up for the crowd’s enjoyment of karaoke.  The reason for the festival?  The celebration of Liquor.  And there were numerous tents full of the stuff, for sure.  But, much more interesting to us were the offerings of steamed bugs, larvae, hotdogs wrapped in waffles, corndogs with french fries fried right into the batter, two dozen types of mushrooms, dried fish rolled to look like wraps and oh, yeah, the ganja tent.  Adjacent to the tent where our beloved innocent offspring sat painting masks for about a dollar each, was a tent where those with something that ailed them could go find out if marijuana might just cure it.

No, nobody smoked it.  They first put a tiny ceramic suction cup on the place on their body that hurt.  I saw one on a shoulder, one on a calf, one on the bottom of a foot…then, the vendor sprinkled a little of the green stuff into the cup and lit it.  It was worse than any 80’s concert you might have gone to and left sick from.  It got so strong I had to walk away and spend some time perusing the Prada bag knockoffs to get my head together.

To protect the identities of the folks inside, I offer you this picture.  You can just barely see the drug dealer’s, I mean, vendor’s — tiny cup in his hand, preaching the wonders of the treatment.  The stacks you see are all full to the brim with the tiny cups.  The tent was always, always full.

To end, I’ll add a few other pics of some of the foods we tried today.  But it’s worth mentioning how friendly and warm the people at the celebration were toward us.  One man shook all five our our hands, and then, folding his like with a prayer, said, “don’t worry, don’t worry, all kinds.”  He meant, you are welcome here.