Stay Where You Are

I bought a snack from one of the street vendors this evening--a fish cake on a skewer. It was sort of grey and chewey, but you dip it in a broth and it's very tasty. I had planned to eat it while walking over to the subway, but I learned that it's considered very rude to eat while you walk. When people get street food here, either they bring it someplace and sit and eat it, or they stand right by the cart and eat it. So at night, you'll see carts with six or seven people huddled around, eating. Very different from the pretzels in midtown.

Baby, You Can Drive My Car

Not a whole lot to report from the peninsula, but a couple of things worth noting. Last night I went out with a lawyer from another firm whom I had met through the Brown alumni association. We went for traditional Korean-style BBQ, where you eat slices of meat, usually beef or pork, cooked on a small grill at the table, with a variety of side dishes. It was excellent. Following dinner, my friend took me to a "hostess bar" (this has apparently been a week of exploring the Korean nightlife). Please note--"hostess bar" does not mean what you think it means. It was a very classy bar that reminded me a bit of the bar at the W hotel in Times Square, with nice couches and good drinks. Men come there to sit and have a drink (or five) after work, and hostesses--pretty and itneresting girls who are dessed up fancy--come and sit and talk, and laugh at their jokes and basically make them feel like a big shot. We hung out and chatted for a few hours, although my limited Korean vocabulary was really stretched, and I was forced to give the gesticulations and facial expressions a real workout. I was tired by the time we left.

Here's the coolest part: we had driven to the bar (called a cafe), and had a substantial amount to drink. It wasn't safe for my friend to drive. So the club provided someone to drive him home (dropping me off along the way) in his own car. I think this is just brilliant, especially for people who live in cities with lousy public transportation (like Boston--oh snap!). You don't have to wait for the subway or bus or call for a cab, and you still have your car at your home the next morning. Incredible! If I didn't have law school stuff to do, I would totally set this up as a business when I get back.

One other brilliant (and completely unrelated) innovation in Korea: When you go to buy tickets for a movie, there's a screen flashing above the counter that shows how many tickets are left for that movie. This way, you can see when you get on line if you're going to be able to get into that 4:30 showing of Batman (starring one half of the looniest couple in the world), or if you're going to have to see the crappy horror movie with Paris Hilton instead.

Almost Famous, and Other Odds and Ends

I realize that I've written a lot about specific events or places I've been to or things I've done, but what's been really amazing (he said introspectively as he entered week IV of Project Korea) has just been the day-to-day of being here. I've been trying to figure out a good way to describe it, and I've decided that being an English-speaking foreigner in Korea is sort of like being a very little bit famous. I don't mean Brad Pitt famous or even really Michael Keaton famous--it's more like being the 12th man of the Knicks bench, or a HITG actor. People look at me an extra second longer and strangers periodically come up to me on the street to talk. Yesterday in particular led to a lot of conversations. I had a late lunch, and so I was the only person in the restaurant. The two women working behind the counter chatted with me for a while and then told me (or rather, conveyed by gestures, facial expressions and saying "Saturday-Sunday" again and again) that I should come back next weekend. Later on that day, I went to the movies with a friend. The movie theater was on the 8th floor of a building, and three kids (two girls and a boy, probably 17 or 18 years old) got on the elevator with us. The young man said "hello," and then "pleased to meet you." I told him I was pleased to meet him too, at which point he pointed to my earring and said, "I like" (which is more than certain Ivy League Presidents have said). I thanked him, and he stuck out his hand for me to shake. "Hand touch-ee," he said. So we shook hands and went on our separate ways.

On the one hand, it's obviously kind of fun. It's nice to have people paying attention to me and making a fuss. But on the other hand, it's kind of frustrating. Most of my conversations can't really progress past the "questions you learn when you first start studying a language" phase, so we pretty much grind to a halt after "what is your name," "where are you from," and do you like Korean food?" Not much to do besides hand touch-ee and move on.

Other sinppets:

--Monsoon season has begun in Seoul. Yesterday it started pouring at about 4:00, and didn't let up until 6:30 the next morning. Non-stop deluge. I will try to bring souveniers home for people, but I may have to leave some things behind so that I can make room for two of every animal on my ark.
--Watching TV on the treadmill, a Japanese station was showing a video of great Hideo Nomo moments (did you know he had 200 wins?! How about that?). Anyway, at one point they showed an extreme close-up of Hideo Nomo lifting weights, and it turns out that he has really, really bad teeth. Just thought you should know.
--Speaking of baseball, Peter Gammons reports the following on espn.com: "According to the Korean News Bureau, South Korean Doosan Bears' pitcher Park Myung-hwan twice lost his cap while delivering a pitch and each time frozen cabbage leaves fell off his head twice in a game on June 19. The frozen cabbage leaves inside the cap were used to keep his head cool. The Korea Baseball Organization has been moved to rule that wearing cabbage leaves inside a baseball cap constitutes an "alien material" that may disrupt a game, prohibited according to the organization's rules, the organization said in a statement Tuesday." I almost went to the game. I think being in attendance for that would have topped being given the finger by Turk Wendell for most memorable moment at a baseball game.
--I went out with some attorneys for dinner tonight, and had a dish called soondofu. I've actually had it in the U.S., but this was different (and better). It's a hot and spicy soup with tofu and some other noodle or filling in it (I had small dumplings). Here, you also get a raw egg that you crack into the soup, and the heat from the soup cooks the egg. It's delicious.
--Finally, two t-shirts seen in Seoul yesterday: "I Lover of Sports" and "Viva Tacos." I think the latter is a sentiment we can all get behind.

Booking

I have a friend at HLS named Namsun who is from Seoul (although he's in DC for the summer). When I told him I was going to Korea, he gave me the contact info for his sister and his best friend, and promised me that they would show me a real "Korean" good time. Boy was he right.

I had dinner last night with Namsun's mom and sister, as well as a few of his close friends, all of whom were exceptionally nice. Namsun's mom (NM) took us to this incredible Japanese restaurant called Akasaka in the Hyatt hotel, which sits at the foot of the hill in Namsan park. We had a great jellyfish salad and a hot egg custard with mushrooms and fish, followed by some of the freshest sushi I've ever had, as well as excellent sake. I'd like to publicly thank NM for such a tremendous meal. You all should be very, very jealous.

After dinner, Namsun's friend whom, for purposes of anonymity we'll call KJ, took me to a nightclub in Apugjeong, which is a trendy area just south of the River. We walked through the entrance, past the dance floor and main floor. There was not a man to been on the dance floor--all girls dancing together, and most of the people sitting at the tables were women as well. We went into a small room in the back that had a horseshoe-table with room for probably a dozen people. There was a karaoke machine with both Korean and English songs, and a small bathroom within the room. There were probably twenty or so of these rooms throughout the club, although there could have been more, as there were several wings of the building that I didn't see.

This type of nightclub practices a process known as "booking" (although I don't know where the name comes from). KJ, his friends and I sat in the room drinking copious amounts of alcohol (which arrived shortly--no soju, thankfully, but plenty of beer, whisky and eventually champagne) and eating. Periodically, one of the club employees, identifiable by a loud paisley vest, would knock. We opened the door, and the employee would be holding one of the girls from outside by the elbow. Looking either unhappy or quite nervous, she would be sort of shoved into the room with us, where she would then sit down and have drinks and food with us. This happened until there were an equal number of guys and women in the room.

I will admit that the whole thing was sort of jarring at first, and I didn't really know what to make of it. It was hard for me to tell if some of the girls who looked unhappy were truly unhappy or if it was part of the way they were expected to behave at first. Most of the girls, once they sat down, giggled nervously and then began to eat and drink and talk with the rest of us, and certainly everyone relaxed a little once the male:female ratio became equal. A few girls who did not want to join us simply didn't come in or got up and walked out. Certainly nobody stayed against her will or was in any way prevented from leaving or anything like that. Many of the girls ate and drank with us, and one who spoke English, when we were both drunk enough, joined me in rousing renditions of both Billie Jean and Yeah! (although I don't remember how we split up Usher, Ludacris and Lil John's parts). I wound up taking a cab home a little before two in the morning, and though I paid for my efforts in the morning with a nice, Korea-style hangover, I had a great time.

Final thought on booking: While it's very different from what we're used to in the States, I think at the end of the day it's just a different culture's way of having men and women meet each other. By introducing a middle man, they cut out the awkwardness of two people meeting at a bar. From what I gather (from talking both to men and to women), both sexes come to booking clubs knowing that this is the practice, and it allows them to meet people. There are other types of nightclubs in Seoul for those who aren't interested, but certainly this was a uniquely Korean experience, and a great night. So thank you to Namsun, KJ and everyone else for a promise certainly well-kept.

Rollin' on the River

Seoul is divided into half by the Hangang River. I live and work south of the river, but a lot of what I've done outside of my neighborhood has been north. Yesterday I thought it might be fun to go check it out. There are lots of recreational parks along the river, where you can go waterskiing, fish and do other things. I wanted something a little more relaxed; I was hoping to just chill by the water, take in the scenery and read for a while. So I went to Yeoudio Park, to the west of my neighborhood.

This was the first disappointing thing I've seen since I've been in Seoul. Partly it was the weather--not only was it hot and muggy, but there was a thick haze in the air so the views across the river weren't very clear. It's actually quite hazy much of the time, and I don't know if it's the climate or the big-city pollution or a combination of the two, maybe more of the latter. There were lots of people biking or rollerblading along river, and almsot all of them wore bandanas over their mouths to keep from breathing in the bad air. The park itself was a letdown. There's a path along the river, but it's not particularly well-kept. The grass is sparse and there's garbage strewn about. Every few yards there's a little snack/souvenir stand selling drinks or childrens' toys. There are floating restaurants and ferries down on the water, but they seemed kind of chintzy, sort of like a more run-down version of the South Street Seaport in New York.

I walked along the river for about an hour until I came to the 63 building, which is the tallest building in Seoul. I couldn't get many good pictures of it because of the haze, but you can check the best one out below. It's very striking because of its gold color, and I like the sleek shape.

So the day, unfortunately, was kind of a bust. The night, however, more than made up for it. More to come...

The 63 Building, the tallest building in Seoul (817 feet)

"Nodle" shop on the Han River

I Feel Pretty

It's starting to get hot in Seoul, and I hadn't had a haircut since the beginning of May, so I figured it was about time. I knew it would be pretty easy to find a place to go, since there are barber poles all over my neighborhood, but I was worried about being able to communicate. It takes a lot of work to look this good, and I didn't want some language barrier to result in my looking like kid who's mom cut his hair for waaaaay too long in elementary school (lest she think I'm insulting her, my mother knew her strengths and weaknesses and had us going to the peanut barber for kids by the time I was 3. I had more haircuts sitting in a racecar or on top of a pony than I can recall).

I asked around the office, and learned that my first priority was to avoid the places with barber poles like the plague, because they might in fact carry the plague. Turns out a barber pole doesn't mean barber shop here. It means an establishment that offers haircuts among, er, "other" services. I protested to my intern friends that perhaps, in the name of blogalistic intrepidness I should go to one of these places, but they weren't having any of it, and helped me find a more reputable establishment.

My friends took me to a salon that was on the third floor of a fashionable area of town called Gagnam (lots of restaurants, bars etc.). I didn't really know what to expect as we walked up the flights, past the Hayana restaurant (motto: "If you want to be better tasting, come here!") I arrived in what I think can, without exaggeration, be called the most metrosexual location Seoul. It was a fancy salon with tons of incredibly attractive female stylists running to and fro, operating high-tech dryers and curling machines and making a fuss. At least half the clients were men. I thought I saw Carson and Thom in the corner, but I can't be sure.

They took my jacket and bag, placed them in a small locker and gave me a key. After draping me in a black robe, I got my hair washed and was then ushed over to a chair. My stylist was Eun Su, who was very sweet and spoke terrific English and, most importantly, laughed at everything I said. She also gives a pretty good hair cut. After I was finished, they washed my hair again. The shampoo-er, whose English was not great, asked me if the water was good. I responded, "yes, okay" (because more people recognize "okay" than "yes"), to which she said "I like you too." This caused her friend, whose English was slightly better, to laugh hysterically for a good 5 minutes.

After shampoo number two, they sat me back down again to dry my hair and touch it up. The woman in charge of this process (I'm now on care-of-hair-taker number four here) asked me what I do, but didn't understand the English word "law." After a few failed attempts, I tried to explain that when the police (a word she knew) arrest you (for which I made the international sign for having my hands cuffed), I help (no reason not to embellish a little, right?). She looked very upset, until Eun Su explained what I meant. I think she thought that I was either a cop or, more likely, an escaped criminal.

After about an hour in their incredibly capable hands, I paid and left. The total cost was 13,500 won, which is less than $15. I felt great and refreshed, with a pretty good hair cut to boot. I love Eun Su and her friends. I'm planning on getting my hair cut every single week I'm in Seoul.

Seattle's Best in Seoul

In the almost-three weeks I've been here I've made it a point to try new things, particularly new foods (bugs and dried squid notwithstanding). Many of you have heard me rant and rave about Americans who go to different countries and then spend all their time eating McDonald's or Pizza Hut or whatever. Why go all that way if you're just going to try and replicate your life back home?

I've been pretty good about this so far, but with one exception--I've had breakfast pretty much every day at Starbucks. There are two reasons for this: 1) Korean breakfast is usually rice or soup or fish, and I need a bagel or muffin or something in the morning and 2) I am the grumpiest jackass in the world if I don't get my morning cup of coffee. Koreans don't really "do" coffee (it's sold here in bars with beer and whisky), and they certainly don't do traditional drip coffee--if anything, you can get Americano (espresso with water). So the American-style chains, which are Starbucks and the Coffee Bean, are really the only place to get a "real" cup of coffee, which I need every morning in the same way that a street-corner junkie needs a "real" blast of heroin.

So each day I've gone in and gotten my coffe and raisin bagel. While I don't believe a raisin bagel is actually a "bagel," in the purest sense of the word (I reject as false all bagels that are not plain, sesame, poppy, onion, salt, everything or pumpernickel--the rest are "donuts"), I've decided that corallary doesn't really apply, because the plain or onion bagels are just sort of dough globs. In that sense, they're sort of like Boston bagels.

Starbucks is really expensive here. My coffee an bagel costs me a little more than $4, and I think I'm the only person inthe place just getting coffee--everyone else gets frappucinos (hugely popular here). The cool thing is that if you recycle your cup by bringing it back to Starbucks, they give you 50 won (about a nickel). But my favorite part is that, because I'm there every day and despite the fact that I don't speak Korean, the two ladies behind the counter and I have developed a really nice rapport. They always make sure I get the best bagels.

Fried-Rice Guy

I'm starting to get a little tired of Korean food, so lately I've been eating Chinese food a little more frequently. The Chinese food here is terrific, a lot better than most of what you get in the states. It's less greasy and more flavorful. Like Korean meals, it's generally served as a bunch of little dishes, although interestingly, things that we would think of as "entrees" such as various chicken or pork dishes are served early in the meal, and the "main" dish is either noodles or rice. Koreans eat their rice with a spoon, not chopsticks. And the food always comes not only with the ever-present kimchee, but also with pickled radishes (which are bright yellow and very tasty) and raw onion with hoison sauce.

Anyway, the other night I went to a Chinese restaurant and sat down. The waitress brought me a menu, but it was entirely in Korean so I couldn't read it. I finally pointed to what another diner was having, fried rice with a spicy black bean sauce, and indicated that I wanted the same (not because I necessarily wanted fried rice, but because we had reached a level of futility in conversation where it was the only way I was getting anything to eat). It was very good (and cheap--dinner was only 4500 won, less than $5), and I went on my merry way.

So last night I went back to the same restaurant and sat down. I had brought my little phrase book with me this time, and was hoping to order something different, a really good sweet and sour pork dish. However, the watiress never came over to take my order. I sat for a while trying to get her attention, and when she finally arrived she had brought me the same plate of fried rice. I didn't really have much choice, so I went ahead and ate it (and it was still good and cheap). So now I either have to find a new Chinese restaurant, or be more pro-active in ordering.

Buy me some peanus and crackerjack and dried squid

After work yesterday, one of my fellow interns and I went to a Korean League baseball game. You all know how much I love baseball, so I was very excited to see a game played here and to get a sense of how it's similar and how it's different.

The game was at Jamsil stadium, which is in the complex where the 1988 Summer Olympics were held (the baseball stadium is next to the much larger soccer stadium). The park itself is the size of a triple-A franchise in the US, and I would estimate could hold around 20-25,000 people. While teams have particular home stadia, they are sponsored by corporations, so we saw the Kia Tigers playing against the LG Twins (LG is a communications company; Kia makes cars). Also, because the country is so small, fans of each team follow their team around. Thus, even though LG was ostensibly the "home" team, there were probably more Kia fans in attendance. It's sort of like a Mets game in Philadelphia (oh snap!).

A few other differences. The stadium is divided into two sides, and all the fans of each team sit on their respective team's side. So all the Kia fans sat on the left side of the field, going up the third-base line out into the left-field bleachers, and the LG fans sat along the first-base dugout going out into the right field bleachers. The people in the bleachers are the super-fans. They all bang thunderstix (those obnoxoius, inflatable balloons) together and chant complicated cheers that require detailed coordination (although at least one sounded suspiciously like "Who let the dogs out?"). There is a sort of cheer-conductor for each section, and each side has four cheerleaders as well. They keep it up the whole game, no matter how lopsided the score gets. When LG went down 9-3, because they suck (more on this in a moment), the cheers got even louder.

You can get all manner of refreshments outside--there are fastfood restaurants like Burgker King and KFC set up, but you can also get veggie sushi, meat on a stick, and the traditional baseball snack of dried squid, which smells just awful. Inside, choices are more limited--it's a squid-free area. You can buy beer from a vendor inside, but why would you want to when you can get it from a dude with a Keg backpack(!) for just 3000 won (about $3). It's warm, flat and tastes terrible, so it's twice the value of a Miller Lite you'd get at Yankee Stadium.

(Korean beer, by the way, is terrible. It makes the crap that we drank at parties in college taste like high-end microbrews. No wonder they stick with soju).

Tickets were really cheap, 8000 won for a field level seat behind home plate. It wasn't terribly surprising that we wound up sitting with a bunch of other Americans who had shown up for the novelty. A few of them were businessmen, probably in their mid-50's, and we chatted for a while. One of them told me it was great to do the ex-pat thing, although of course back when he did it there was no internet or email or international calling or anything and SHUT UP SHUT UP I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU DON'T SHUT UP!

Certain other highlights:
--Trying to figure out how fast a 142 km/h fastball is.
--Talking about A-Rod's play in last year's ALCS when a Kia player knocked the ball out of the first baseman's hands.
--Watching one LG player stroll to bat with "Ask the Lonely" by Journey as his intro music.
--There's no 7th inning stretch, but they drag the infield after the 5th inning (although no "YMCA" crap here). When they drag the field, all the players wait in the dugout, except for a few who stretch on the outfield grass. This is different from the US where players work around the infield crew while they do their warmups.

Last thing: nobody boos. LG played a terrible game. They were charged with three errors and should have had more except for some generous scoring. They entered the bottom of the 8th down 9-3, but rallied for 4 runs (and almost tied it on a two-out, one-on flyball that juuuuust hooked foul) in the bottom of the 8th to make it 9-7 going into the final frame. Needing to shut the Tigers down quickly, LG's pitcher promptly walked the first batter, made an error on the ensuing sacrifice bunt (putting runners on first and second), and then threw away a pickoff attempt, putting runners on 2nd and 3rd with nobody out without a ball travelling more than 40 feet. Of course, both runners ended up scoring and the Twins never had a chance. It was reminiscent of some of Toby Borland's best work (and serious props to anyone besides my dad and my brother who remembers Toby Borland). In New York, this would have prompted a cascade of abuse that might have caused the pitcher to snap and charge into the stands. Here, nothing.

Well, not quite nothing. I booed. You can take the kid out of New York, but you can't take the New York out of the kid.

Jamsil Stadium. You can see the bleacher creatures in the LF stands.

Hey. Beer. Man.

Baseball, hot dogs, and squid. Might as well be in Red America.

He's no Cowbell Man, but still...

There are steroids in the bathroom.

Pride

There's no equivalent here, but I wanted to take a moment and wish everyone a happy Pride month. I marched in the parade in New York last year, and it was just awesome.

In other news, duh.

Fore!

Not much of interest happening today, but I saw this article and it's definitely true. There are driving ranges every 10 feet here.

Lights, Camera, Action!

Just got back from the movies. In addition to Korean movies, many of the theaters show American movies with subtitles in English. The only real difference is that when you buy your ticket you get an assigned seat, which I guess is cool, but makes it harder to move if you sit behind the tall dude with the big hair.

Also, I'd like to wish a happy father's day to my dad. I know many of you have as well, and he really appreciates it.

--AIS

Straphangers

A word ought to be said about the subway system here in Seoul. It's enoromous, and but very easy to use. It's similar to the New York system, except every station (or at least, every station that I've been in thus far, which is probably a little more than a dozen) is enormous, about the size of Union Square in New York or Park Street in Boston. Each station has at least 6 and as many as 12 different exits that go to different places, and if you go out the wrong exit you'll find yourself in a completely different part of town, and because the roads are so dangerous, you won't be able to cross. When you give directions, you generally will say something like "take the #2 train to Gagnam and then go out exit 4," as the exit number is a critical part of getting to your destination.

A few other things. The subways are very clean and fast, and many have velvet seat covers on the seats. Also, cell phones get full reception on the trains and in the station. While I think this would be a total disaster in New York (everyone would be on the phone, all the time--can you imagine how annoying the morning commute would be), here it's not a big deal, as most people don't appear to have long cell phone converstations, although they text message a lot.

My other favorite thing about riding the subway here is the old people. When an old person, especially an older man, gets on the train, he has no hesitation about marching right up to someone sitting down and demanding that person's seat. It's a lot of fun to watch. I always make sure to get up right away, lest I incur the wrath of an angry old Korean man. There are some people you just don't fuck with.

Into the hills...

Today I went to the northern part of Seoul to visit one of the hillside towns where some of the Buddhist and Shamanist temples are. Basically, you get out of the subway stop and just start walking uphill. I don't know if you can tell from the pictures below, but it's incredibly steep. It was a hot day, and after about 10 minutes of walking my shirt was totally soaked through. You just keep going up and up into the mountains.

After about 15 minutes of walking I came to the gate of the town and went in. I had my little Lonely Planet guide to follow, but that was about it as all the signs were only in Korean and there was almost nobody around. It was definitely the farthest away from civilization that I've felt since I got here. So I just kept going up, periodically seeing these small hillside homes that appear to be populated exclusively with single old women. I saw nary a man nor child, and nobody who appeared to be under 50.

I knew that I wanted to get to the Shamanist shrine Guksadang, but the path appeared to be blocked by a small piece of plywood about knee high. So I stepped over the plywood, wondering if this was not, in fact, a big mistake. Yep. Big mistake. I took two steps forward and three dogs came rushing at me, barking. They weren't very big, but two of them were quite aggressive, and started jumping up and grabbing my shorts with their teeth. At that moment a Korean woman came out and shoo-ed them away and apologized to me. I had inadvertantly wandered into here yard. She pointed the way to me, and off I went.

I spent about 45 minutes wandering around the hillside, looking at the shrines and temples. The shrines are modest, but there were a few peple at each one who had come to pray, so I was very quiet and asked permission before taking any pictures. I eventually hiked all the way up to the top of the mountain, which was satisfying, although the footing wasn't great and getting down was quite precarious. Still, it was pretty cool, and it was amazing to be only 20 minutes from a subway station and yet completely cut off from the city. If you didn't know, you wouldn't know. You know?

Guksadang, a Shamanist shrine built in 1395.

I started off down here...

...and ended up here!

One of the alleyways in the hillside town.

Bongwonsa

Painting on the wall of Bongwonsa, a Buddhist temple.

Buddha carving

Seounboui, the shrine where women come to pray for a son.

Feeling Fishy

After a while in Namdemun, I decided to head over to the Noryangjin fish market. This is not a standard tourist destination, but you all know how much I geek out over markets and food, so this was a must-see for me (if you don't know how much I geek out over this stuff, please send me an email because we should get to know each other--full disclosure, I stole that joke from my friend Jill). It's basically acres and acres of fish in all forms--live, dried, on ice, etc. And there are all different kinds of shellfish and other things on display. Enormous mussels, stingrays, and some of the biggest crabs I have ever seen. Check out the pictures below. I don't think they even do it justice.

One of the coolest things about Noryangjin is that for about 15,000 won you can get a plate of sliced sashimi that was swimming about an hour ago. The food is incredibly fresh. I bought one such plate, and was brought over to a little picnic area at tha back of the market to eat it. You take a couple of pieces of fish and wrap it in a lettuce leaf with red pepper sauce, fresh garlic and jalepeno. It's simply outstanding.

Also at the picnic area was an older Korean man, who wanted to drink with me. He kept pointing to a cooler of soju and saying "Soju! Soju!" I showed him my bottle of water and offered him some in a glass. He asked "alcohol?" and I shook my head, no. He poured a little in his glass, smelled it, and then dumped it out. He said, "Soju!" again. You would think I would have learned from my epxerience the other night. But I thought to myself, "Self, how often do you get to share a bottle of crappy sweet potato liquor with a total stranger with whom you can't communicate in the back area of a fish market?" The answer: not very. Besides, in case you haven't figured it out, I'm incredibly susceptible to peer pressure. So I bought a bottle of soju, and we split it, about three drinks apiece. In Korean culture you never pour your own drink, so we took turns pouring for each other. The woman who ran the little area also joined us. A good time--well worth the woozy subway ride home.

The Noryangjin fish market

Stingray is in season.

Crabs.

Shellfish for sale.

My drinking buddies!

This little piggy went to market

After a brief adventure with the dry cleaner (she held up my shirt asking "dry?" I thought she meant, "do you want dry cleaning or just laundering and pressing?" whereas she actually meant, "for dry cleaning, right? Boy, this would be easier if you spoke a word of my language." So when I said, "No dry," she laughed hysterically and explained to me, I think, that this was a dry cleaner and that was all they did. So I nodded and said, "Oh, okay. Yes dry." I have no idea what my shirts will look like when I pick them up. End parenthetical.), I decided to make today a market day. I didn't really want to buy anything, but I like the hectic feel of markets, and Seoul apparently has some of the best. First I went to Namdemun market, which is sort of like an enormous version of the Chelsea flea market. Just row after row of people hawking their wares, yelling at you to come and buy whatever it was they were selling. Lots of clothes on sale, as well as jewelry, cookware, leather goods, electronics, sunglasses and all kinds of food. They sell ginseng wine, with the root still inside the jar. It looks sort of like an enormous squid preserved in honey-colored formaldehyde. I also saw (but did not purchase) a great array of Korean doggy treats.

The highlight, however, came when I bargained for my belt. I'd like to point out that a) I'm a terrible bargainer and b) I haven't taken negotiation at HLS yet and c) I don't speak any Korean. Nevertheless, I needed a brown belt, I saw a brown belt, and I purchased a brown belt. The asking price was 12,000 won, and I got it for 10,000 (1000 won is a buck and change). An enormous moral victory for yours truly. Maybe I can skip the class and just start teaching negotiation next year.

Namdemun market, with the hustle and the bustle.

Ginseng wine for sale in Namdemun

I think these are suckling pigs, but I'm not sure.

Namdemun gate, one of the national treasures of Korea, right outside the market.

Culinary (mis)adventures

So it was not until I went to the gym last night and sweated profusely that I think I finally rid my body of the remaining soju toxin. Man, that's evil stuff. I promise to be much more sensible when I have it again on Saturday night.

Following my workout, I went to get dinner. Because the restaurant I went to had burnders on the tables, I thought I was at one of the grill-your-own-meat places. Turns out I was wrong. After pointing to a few things listed in my Lonely Planet: Seoul and getting head shakes, I simply nodded when the waitress suggested something. I got a very spicy soup, with kimchee, green onions, sprouts and...weenies. Yep, little chopped up bits of hot dog, which had the consistency and taste of baloney, infiltrated my otherwise completely authentic Korean meal. I asked my fellow interns later what this was, but honestly I can't remember the name and even if I could, I certainly can't spell it. The moral of the story is that from now on I'm either ordering something I know the name of or at least can point to on a picture menu.

Today's meal was relatively mundane--we went to an Italian restaurant, and I had the linguini alfredo, which would have been great except I ordered spaghetti carbonara. But my expectations we're pretty low for Italian food in Seoul, so I wasn't too upset. Afterwards, the attorneys took us for potbingsu, which is sort of like frozen yogurt mixed with shaved ice and fruit and cornflakes. So if you had a very, very cold breakfast, this is what it would look like. It was actually quite tasty and very refreshing for a hot day.

That's about it for today. Happy it's Friday and the work week is over. This weekend will involve seeing some Buddhist temples and checking out a market or two, and possibly hanging out down by the river (I will see if I can find the requisite van--props to anyone who got that joke). There will be pictures as well.

Gombei!

Gombei! is what you say when you drink, the "cheers" or "l'chaim" of Korea. I learned this last night when I was introduced to Soju.

Soju is the local spirit of choice in Korea, mostly made from distilled sweet potatoes. It's not very tasty, but it's cheap and very, very potent. It's pronounced "SO-jew," as in "Art always gesticulates wildly while talking; he's like, SO-jew ish." It apparently loosely translates into "you may be having a good time now, but you're going to regret this in the morning."

Here is what happens when you drink soju: Last night I went out with a fellow intern and a few of her Korean friends, and they ordered soju (my friend steered clear of the stuff--perhaps I should have followed her lead and stuck to beer). We had a rockin' good time, talking about Korea and the U.S., which culminated in a lesson in American slang, the details of which I'll spare you, but which I'm sure you can imagine if you know me well enough to be reading this blog. I staggered home close to midnight, pausing breifly to drunk dial my remarkably patient father at his office. I got off the phone, and as I stood at the crosswalk waiting for the light to change, I saw a cab pull up and deposit a man on the sidewalk. His footing was unsteady as he got out, and he had the same goofy grin that I did. We made eye contact. He smiled and said, "are you drunk?" I said, "soju." He smiled and nodded and said, "Me too." Then after a pause, "I am sooooooo fucked up!" (I want you to try and picture this. It's almost midnight, I'm standing in the middle of one of the busiest streets in Seoul, having a drunken conversation with a totally bombed Korean businessman the bulk of whose English consits of the words "drunk" and "soooooo fucked up!" Needless to say, I thought the whole thing was a riot). We crossed the street and talked for another minute (or rather, gesticulated). He invited me to keep drinking with him, but it occurred to me that this is probably how people get kidnapped and held hostage in the North, so I declined and went home and passed out.

Let's just say that this was a bad morning. Soju is like the bad one-night stand who wants you to make her breakfast. She's not leaving without a fight (mom, dad, I was speaking metaphorically there, okay?). The headache and cottonmouth were pretty bad, but I'd have to say the worst part of the hangover was the fact that sudden movement (by which I mean "any movement at all") made me nauseous all morning. The last time I was this hungover for a morning's activity I suggested to the group that we play "rock," the game where you try to be as quiet and still as possible.

I somehow made it through the day. The Korean lawyers think it's great that I got drunk on soju, sort of a rite of passage. But I've learned a lesson, and am going to take it easy from now on. Or at least until Friday.

Goodbye, Fruity Tuesday

Many things about Korean law firms are similar to those in the U.S.--lots of paper, no earrings (for men), many billable hours. Many things are different. For one, all the lawyers on each floor eat lunch together every single day. At noon, the building empties out as the entire firm goes off to one of a dozen or so establishments and has lunch. Nobody--I mean, nobody--eats at their desk. I brought a muffin in for breakfast one morning and got a few quizzical glances. Also, when they have lunch, nobody talks about work. Sports, drinking and a whole host of topics that I can't understand are the subject of conversation, but not work. Then at 1:00, everyone goes back to the office.

This is not just my firm, mind you. This, as far as I can tell, is the entire city. At noon, the streets are just packed.

And then, nobody leaves the office for the rest of the day. Well, they go out for dinner when they're working late, but nobody steps out at 4:00 to get a cup of coffee or anything like that. The only break comes some afternoons when the secretaries make all the attorneys (and now, the interns) a fruit cup. Today, I got a small dixie cup featuring a piece of watermelon, a small orange slice, a piece of something tasty but unidentifiable, and two pieces of carrot.

So far this has happened twice, last Tuesday and this Tuesday. I don't know if it's a "Tuesday thing" (how much would you love Fruity Tuesdays!) or it's coincidence. I am monitoring the situation, and will report as further news becomes available.

Okay, okay.

Since I arrived here a little more than a week ago, I've found people to be phenomenally helpful and patient. Those who speak English have helped me navigate through a fairly daunting language barrier, and those who don't have found ways to help me communicate regardless (I dropped some stuff off at the dry cleaner the other day, and there was more gesturing, shouting and pointing than at your average Samuels Family Seder--zing!). The one frustrating thing is people are very hesitant to say no or to indicate that they don't understand. They want to be helpful, so they say "okay, okay" even when it's not. On Sunday morning I wanted to go to the gym, but some of the entrances to the building it's in (a skyscraper across the street) were closed. I tried to ask the security guard if the club was open, but he just kept saying "okay, okay." "It's closed?" "Okay, okay." "So it's open [making open-arms gesture--he probably was praying that I didn't want to embrace him]?" "Okay, okay?" It continued like this for about five minutes before I left, nary a weight lifted or meter run. And who's on first?

This is, of course, entirely my fault. The guy was trying to be helpful, and I'm sure if he understood what I said he would have answered me. If I could even learn a sentence of Korean--or for that matter, have remembered to bring a Korean-English dictionary--I could have found out the answer to my question. It is, after all, his country. But I'm going to hear "okay, okay" differently when I get back to the states.

One More Thing...

I saw today that Michael Jackson got acquitted. I don't know what to say, except ma ma say ma ma sa ma ma coo sah.

My friend Raj...

...says that "I'll read your blog," is the hot new lie told by twenty-somethings (replacing the courtesy, post-date "I'll call you"). Many of you told me this lie. So if you wouldn't mind commenting on my insightful, poetic and witty posts (not to mention the breathtaking photography (and the excessive use of parenthteticals)), I would greatly appreciate the opportunity to tell Raj to shove it.

How did they get my iPod?

Songs overheard this afternoon in the restaurant where I took my lunch break: Candy Shop by 50 cent; Milkshake, by Kellis; Get Right, by "I'm Still I'm Still Jenny from the Block." Apparently you can pick up Hot 97 in Seoul.

Confession

I've made a big deal about how I really want to immerse myself in the culture while I'm here, and I always talk trash about Americans who go to foreign countries and eat McDonald's, etc. But on Saturday night, after a week of nothing-but-Korean food and a day of walking all over Seoul, we were pretty much spent. So before we left Insadong, we went to the batting cage (right next to the tea room), and then got a burger at TGI Friday's. So in some respects, Seoul is exactly like Seekonk, Mass.

It's Good to be the King

On Sunday, I went to Gyongbokung, one of the palace compounds first built in the 14th century. The history is interesting (it was the seat of the Korean monarchy for a number of centuries, and was then the seat of the imperial Japanese government when they occupied Korea--the Koreans say it the Japanese intentionally located authority here to deride a Korean cultural landmark), but what I think really blows you away is the sheer beauty of the place. It sits on a very flat piece of land, and you can see the mountains looming in the background. It's pretty awesome, in the way the word was used before it described Pizza Hut pizza. You can understand why the king wanted to be here.

Also at Gyongbokung: A number of people came up to me to ask me to help them practice English. At first, I thought this was really weird (especially when two girls who looked pretty young asked me if "we could go somewhere quiet to talk"), but it turns out that they were students in an English class and had been given an assignment to speak with a native English speaker for 5 minutes, and to videotape it. Since I was the most conspicuous English speaker at Gyongbokung (you may find this hard to believe, but people can tell I'm not Korean!), I was the obvious choice. So I got to meet some very nice people who's English is a whole helluva lot better than my Korean.

Gyongbokung, with the mountains in the background.

The outside of the palace walls

The king's throne room

A pavilion where dignitaries were received.

Korean for "selling crappy souvenirs to tourists."

After the traditional village, we went to Insadong, a shopping district that is closed off to vehicular traffic (note: you have no idea how good an idea this is. While the major boulevards are hazardous, the side streets are flat-out deadly. Cars hurtle down windy little roads at Andretti-esque speeds, and clearly care not a whit if they hit you. Moreover, they don't even use the horn. They just drive up behind you and hope that you notice them before you get hit. I've taken to flattening myself up against the walls of buildings and sliding along, the way a character does when he's on the ledge in a movie. Perhaps because there's almost no violent crime in Korea, they feel the need to make up for it by inducing as many car fatalities as possible). It's actually pretty nice. We stopped for shikeh (see below) in a beautiful garden off the street, and wandered around looking at the wares for sale. The more "upscale" part of Insadong ends in an explosion of neon, and all of a sudden you're in the Seoul equivalent of Times square, with a hundred different establishments vying for your attention (and your wan) all at once. Kind of a sensory overload, but pretty cool nevertheless. I'm not posting all of my pictures, but I have some nice ones from this excursion, so if you'd like me to email them to you, lemme know.

Insadong, where there are bight lights and an enormous piano on the street.

Shikeh, a sweet rice punch made of, I guess, rice.

It's all really good, except...

Street food in Insadong. I love NY, but this is even better than the honey roasted peanuts they sell on 6th Ave.

...for this

Fried silkworm larvae, a popular street snack. It smells as good as it looks.

T-Shirt Interlude

You know how you see people in New York or other cities wearing t-shirts with Chinese characters on them, and you wonder if maybe the wearer has no idea what it means and the shirt actually says "stupid white person," or something like that? There's a similiar phenomenon here (without the "stupid" part). I've seen all kinds of t-shrits and signs that warrant a double-take, although I can't remember them all. My two favorites from today: "Always Dead or Alive" (which pretty much covers all the bases) and "It's happy time somewhere." Hopefully, it's happy time wherever you are.

Seoul? Flatbush Ave? You decide.

Namsangol Traditional Village

After the tower, we went to Namsangol Traditional Village, a/k/a "The Korean Colonial Williamsburg." Here, a city is preserved in the style of the Joseon Dynasty, which began in the late 1300's and lasted through the end of Korea's monarchy (early 20th Century). As you can see in the pictures below, they demonstrate traditional Korean games and other aspects of traditional Korean life. Sadly, there was nobody churning butter (only 3 people got that joke, but it's my blog, so tough).

Proof that I didn't just download these from a website. No Jayson Blair, I.

In the traditional village

See-saw, old-school style.

Traditional Wrestlers in Namsangol

We're moments away from a People's Elbow!

A view from the top

The Seoul Tower over Namsan park. You take a cable car to the top of the mountain.

Exploring Seoul, an essay in three parts

Yesterday I got to really go out and explore Seoul for the first time since getting here. One of my fellow-interns and I went north of the river (The Hangang River divides the city) to go sightseeing. First stop was Namsan park, where we took a cable car to the top of one of the highest peaks in Seoul. This deserves a quick word. Apparently, Seoul is the most mountainous big city in the world. I could cite all sorts of statistics to back this up, but I could only do so if I actually knew such statistics, so instead take my word that it's really, really hilly. This fact makes it even more impressive (or perhaps, masochistic) that so many of the women wear high heels all day, even for weekend leisure activities. People in Seoul tend not to walk that much, preferring to take the subway, bus or taxis. I guess this is why.

The restuarant where I had the incredible meal, steps from my apartment.

You Are What You Eat

Since I'm not getting much to do at the office, life here pretty much continues to revolve around food. Every day the lawyers take us out for lunch, and seem to enjoy throwing more and more "exotic" food my way to see if I'll eat it. I have yet to disappoint--I haven't heard what a "good eater" I was this many times since I was six years old. But the food is consistently excellent. Today I went with my mentor, a senior partner and one of the other interns to a traditional Korean restaurant. I don't know where to begin. We sat on the floor (which is cool but plays havoc with my legs) in this beautiful room with a gorgeous bamboo mat on the floor and rich wood everywhere, and that had a view of a garden. The meal is a series of close to 20 small dishes served in waves of six or seven, rather than a Western appetizer-entree-dessert sequence. It's mostly fish and vegetables, with a little beef and pork thrown in. Among other things, we had pickled skate, incredibly tasty fresh bamboo, abalone, boiled octopus and sea cucumber. The food was beautifully presented, rich in taste and color. My two favorite dishes were a kim-chee pancake (like a scallion pancake you'd get at a Chinese restuarant but much, much better) and an after-meal drink made from persimmon, cinnamon and nutmeg. I'll see if I can find out some names for you.

Tomorrow I'm off to the old city and a traditional village. I'm bringing my camera, and if I can figure out how to upload them, there should be some pictures here.

--AIS

Weird Korean Law Fact of the Day

From a Ministry of Justice guide to foreign investors, on personnel management:

"An employer must grant each female employee one day's menstruation paid leave

per month."

Just like Bally's except...

Since Seoul appears to be a terrible city for running--the air is polluted, the drivers make a conscious effort to run you over and it's very, very hilly--I joined a gym. Another intern who speaks Korean helped me through the process, which essentially entailled my turning over my credit card and later signing something. I believe this is how people wind up as prisoners on Japanese game shows.

The gym is nice, but very weird. For starters, there's a uniform. Each time you come in, you receive a set of gym clothes from the front desk. For men, it's black shorts, a grey t-shirt and grey socks. Women get the same, but with a red shirt. You are also expected to bring separate shoes to wear while working out. The first time I went I arrived in my gym clothes, and received all kinds of weird looks for not being in uniform. One of the trainers actually came over and told me that my shoes were dirty and asked if I needed new ones. I declined, but am probably sticking with the uniform from now on.

Aenyong Haseo...

..means "hello," and it's what you say when you meet someone for the first time. I said it a lot on Tuesday, because I met every single one of Bae, Kim and Lee's 140 lawyers. We interns worked our way down nine floors, saying hello to every lawer (it took about an hour and a half). I've got the little bow of greeting one does down pat.

The lawyers here are very nice, and seem very collegial. The lawyers on each floor have lunch together every day, and they've been taking us out to eat with them. Most speak at least some English, and about half speak perfectly (it looks like about 15% did their JD and/or undergrad in the U.S., and a whole bunch more have American LLM degrees), so we talk about law school, life in Korea etc. Almost all the lawyers are men, and I have yet to see any of the few female lawyers out at lunch. By contrast, ALL the secretaries are women. They are friendly too, and all giggle whenever I say pretty much anything. So in that respect it's just like home.

The internship coordinator is a very friendly woman named Eunsook, who is embarassed about her English but speaks very well. She laughs uproriously at my daily cultural miscues. She walks with this wobbly, mincing gate that makes it appear as though she could tip over at any minute. Most of the women walk this way, with very quick small steps. The men also walk very quickly, in sort of a herky-jerky motion. Walking around the office I've been very conscious of

my rather elongated American strides. Also of the fact that I have no idea what anyone around me is saying.

One other thing--all the lawyers have these little flip-flops that they wear while they're in the office. I think this is incredibly cool.

College Town

Monday was a national holiday here (Memorial Day), so I went exploring with one of the other interns and her friends from law school who are also here. We went to a part of town called Sinchun, which is where there are lots of universities. It fit my expectation of a Korean city. Lots of bars/restaurants etc. piled right on top of each other, and blinking neon everywhere. For those of you in/from New York, think Canal Street on steroids. We ate and then played poker at a board game cafe, which is a popular thing to do here. Basically, you go to a cafe and they have lots of board games (we played poker with monopoly money, which worked surprisingly well). Other popular forms of entertainment are norebang, which is like Kareoke but in a private room with your friends, and DVD-bang, which means you and your friends rent a room and a movie and watch it. I was advised against DVD-bang, because apparently the DVD-bang rooms are a popular destination for amorous couples whose urges are frustrated by living with their parents. Quoth my friend, "the floors are really, really gross."

Getting there is half the fun

I arrived in Seoul on Sunday after a 15 hour flight, direct. It wasn't so terrible, although sitting in row 64 of 65, right by the bathrooms, wasn't ideal. The highlight came about an hour into takeoff, when they brought lunch around. We were given a choice of Korean food (min ed beef with rice, kim-chee, vegetables and a "hot pepper paste" that came in a miniature toothpaste tube) or Salisbury steak. Figuring "when in Rome," I opted for Korean food. All the Koreans sitting around me took the Salisbury steak. Inauspicious.

After getting through immigration and renting a cell phone, I found a taxi to get to my apartment. Addresses in Seoul are kind of funny. Nobody uses street names or numbers. Instead, the city is divided into more than 500 neighborhoods, called dong. I live in Yoksam-dong, for example. Your address is the building number within the dong (say, 637 Yoksam-dong, where my apartment is). Here's the trick: Rather than number the buildings according to their location--building 1 next to building 2 next to building 3 etc.--buildings are numbered according to when they were built. So building 1 can be next to building 1042. Finding your destination is sort of like getting into a cab and saying, "please take me to the 217th building ever built in Chelsea." The way I got to my apartment was to have the cabbie call the

landlord, who gave him directions. Apparently, this happens all the time.

Yoksam-dong is a financial center, and looks a little like Midtown Manhattan. There are some major avenues (drivers show no mercy--you take your life into your hands if you jaywalk) with tall glass skyscrapers, and then off of the main thoroughfares are hilly, winding streets with lots of bars and restuarants. Coffee is a new phenomenon here (although there are two Starbucks

around the corner, one of which is the biggest Starbucks I've ever been in), and is primarily served at bars with whisky and beer. The food is excellent, although I'm wary of a popular Korean street snack, silkworm larvae fried to a crisp. And I'm looking forward to checking out the nearby Brooklyn Hip-Hop club.

Technical Difficulties

Sorry for the delay the past few days. I tried to post from a web cafe despite the fact that the instructions were entirely in Korean, and appear to have destroyed the entire blog. However, I have now resurrected it, and since I have the web in my apartment, can use an English-speaking computer. Enjoy!

--AIS