Korean Wedding

I have no idea who got married but I went to a Korean wedding today. It is wedding season here in Korea. Apparently you can bring anyone you want as long as you pay for their meal. So that is how I found myself in a wedding of 2 people I have never met.

So Korean weddings are very boring. For a culture that loves to drink, weddings are a very sober affair. You go, they start in the morning. The couple bows to the mother's parents, then the father's parents while guests talk the whole time. My cousin kept chatting with me and I found it very bizarre, like shouldn't we be paying attention? Then the couple stands in the front while various groups of people stand next to them to get their pictures taken.

The guests go eat their meal (giving the wedding hall people a ticket to show you have paid). The couple comes into the dining hall while you eat, they cut the cake (but no one eats the cake so I was curious where this cake goes after they cut it, do they take it home? No sharing?!) and then they pour champagne into a champagne fountain (none of the champagne glasses are shared either $#@&Y*&^&$!). No dancing, no open bar, no DJ, no live band singing Journey songs, I got the sads.*

My family was talking shit because it wasn't buffet style which is funny because in the States we would prefer non-buffet style. My aunt then made my cousin steal the rice cakes in her purse to take home. My aunt is not poor by any means. She carried a Tod's purse to the affair, but stealing from restaurants crosses all socio-economic levels for Koreans. I remember my mom making me sneak food in my purses in high school and this mortified me. Now, I feel very normal about it all.

So that was my Korean wedding experience. The highlight was def when my cousin and I walked in late to the ceremony and a guy who was a very very mediocre singer was serenading the couple standing right next to them. I felt so awkward. While we may not drink like fishes like we normally do, I guess we still need to throw in a little karaoke.

*My cousin did state that sometimes the couple and their close friends will party the night before the wedding however I can't imagine looking great in your wedding pictures with a wicked hangover.

Korean Movie Theaters are Far Superior

You can pick your own seats when you buy your tickets (no need to sit in the theater for 45 minutes to ensure good seeating). You can get up to 3 different flavors of popcorn in one bucket (next time I am sticking with butter and caramel, my hands still reek of garlic). They have different color straws for those first daters and separate straw holes in the soda cups. They also have ladies accept your garbage at the end to separate for recycling. How clever!

Exhibit A:

Girl in full plastic surgery burka-like get up.

Garlic, Cheese, Caramel

Karate Kid here is translated to "Best Kid"

Korean food to the Max

I like homestyle Korean restaurants rather than fancy ones with service. This is because they leave you your utensils, your water, your big ass beer. The waitresses are there to carry the piping hot food from the kitchen but that is all. They either leave the check immediately when your food comes out (since authentic Korean restaurants don't serve dessert) or you holler (literally holler because there is a lot of borderline yelling at the waitresses and it's perfectly acceptable).

The American system of tipping bothers me. I always leave at least 20-25% because that is the socially accepted norm. But once my waiter starts to really suck, I start evaluating their performance in my head. Well, my water has been empty for about 70% of this meal. I had to wait 45 min for my bill after I asked for it TWICE. But he was quite charming in the beginning and he is an awfully cute gay. I start putting monetary values on my lost opportunity cost and deducting from the standard 20%. Then some dining friends insist on doubling the tax (16%) while I like to leave 20-25%, everyone has numbers in their head. Why should I have to deal with this added stress when I am trying to enjoy a meal with my friends?? Why??? Rarely have I experienced a server so awful that I deduct. However, on the occasions that I do, I feel like a grade school teacher. Can't I enjoy my f in dessert and get on with my life?

There was one extreme example in the States where I saw one waitress go around a bar asking every group she served, if there was something 'wrong' with the service because she didn't think they tipped it enough. I saw her flip this game to 4 different groups in the duration of my stay. Obviously that waitress was a terrible person, but if we got rid of this tipping sytem, we would also get rid of the tackiness of having to deal with money issues between friends and the strangers that serve us. Are we so obsessed with putting money values on everything and utilizing it as personal motivation that we must, on occasion, sour our downtimes with money matters?

I have had my American waiter friends want to leave like 30% for standard service just because they like to receive big tips when they work and they sympathize. This is their livelihood for goodness sake, or so they say. The tipping system is better because otherwise waiters wouldn't work as hard because they have no individual motivation. This is some BS argument to me. Waiters would work hard for the same reason the rest of the non-service workers work hard, because they're scared of getting fired.

I didn't need my clients to tip me a monetary value after every conference call to know if I did a good job or not. I showed up to work, not because I would lose out on tips for the day, but because otherwise my boss would notice and I would be unemployed. Yes, it is different because most service people aren't necessarily working towards a promotion at the restaurant (maybe at chain restaurants like Applebee's where they use that as motivation). However, the switch from a tipping to non-tipping system wouldn't give you extra motivation to completely slack off. You work because you need a job.

My waiter friends also point out that if we didn't have a tipping system, service would be deplorable. Well, I've been to 2 cities in recent memory with a non-tipping system and I have not had one noteworthy horrible waiter. In fact, for the most part the service was the same, if not better. I challenge anyone to say different that the service is noticeably different in those places.

Anyways, I go off topic as per usual. The soup was amazing, I love egg custard. The end.

Splish, Splash I Was Taking a Bath

Koreans don't 'do' shower curtains. The first day I came and saw the bathroom situation, I thought I was expected to take baths instead of showers every time I cleaned myself. My host is my distant relative, Yona and she explained to me that Koreans just let the water run into a drain that every Korean bathroom floor has.

Me: But wait the floor will get wet

Yona: It's OK, it just dries

Me: radio silence

Normally, I am the type of person that towels off completely before I step out of the tub because I have a fear of slipping on a wet bathroom floor and crushing my skull on a sink. I know this is a weird neurotic fear of mine, along with my fear of balloons (I guess the balloon thing is more silly than neurotic). I would like to note for the record that this fear of mine was validated when watching a documentary about government funded funerals and they discovered a guy who had been in his bathrooms for days before discovery. But I digress.

Now I remember coming to Korea years ago in high school where some of my relatives didn't even have a bathtub and I had to just pour buckets of water over myself (cold water mind you) and it would run into a drain. I have a westernized apartment now and would think the shower curtain thing would catch on along with every other thing they have adopted but I was wrong.

I, as a born and bred American, took a few showers to get used to this. The first time I showered, I was sitting awkwardly in the tub with the shower head 2 inches away from me trying not to let a drop of water splash outside the tub. When I got out of the shower, I took every step as if it were my last to avoid slipping in the few puddles I managed to let escape. Yes, Yona left me a pair of rubber slippers in the bathroom but my feeble American mind did not put two and two together.

Bath times were stressful to say the least for my first few baths but now I am embracing this lack of curtain thing. I mean, shower curtains are usually ugly. They sometimes get slimey. It is one more thing to upkeep in the bathroom when cleaning. You have the added stress of picking out a shower ring and curtain design. Shower doors are nice, but in NY I have yet to afford an apartment with a shower door. And with the added plus of a drain in the floor I have realized that when I clean my bathroom I can just hose down the room in a bathing suit, mirrors, floors, walls, and all and let the dirt and grime go down the drain.

For me, this is one example of Korean brilliance. I would say up there with thundersticks but below taekwondo.

Editors Note: Koreans sometimes have shower doors but they have a gap so that the water leaks out anyways.

Missing Bacon

So after just 4 days here, I am already missing the American style breakfast.

Brunch in NY is something we all take for granted. American brunch is a growing trend here however it is obviously not ubiquitous and one can't walk out the door to get one. If only my local soondae guk(blood sausage soup) place would switch to egg making in the morning. A girl can dream!

For now, I will have to make my own brunches (I am really considering keeping bottles of champagne on hand for mimosas on the weekends). Scrambled eggs and fried bread will have to suffice.

Oh eggs benedict how I yearn for you...