Last night a bunch of people from work went out to a Chinese restaurant in the “meat market” which is local foreigner-slang for the west end of the La Festa shopping center (which my apartment building is directly adjacent to). I don’t know how the area got that name — whether because of the large number of restaurants, the existence of place(s) specifically selling meat (which I haven’t seen as something salient), or because of the nightclub scene (which as you know I tend to avoid). Anyway, there are some good restaurants there, and the Chinese place is a regular haunt for semi-official LBridge staff outings. Note that “Chinese” is interpreted broadly: just as getting “Chinese” in America is hardly the same as getting food in China, I rather doubt there’s more than a passing similarity between China’s authentic cuisines and what they call “Chinese” in Korea. But it’s pretty good.
Today, after the unhealthy food last night, I was craving kimchi bokkeumbap. I ordered some delivered from 김家네 (Kim Family’s House), the convenient take-out and delivery place on the corner. Having lunch delivered to the staff room at LBridge is nearly universal, but I tend not to do it except rarely, as the portions are always larger than I should eat regularly. There are lots of places that deliver, but 김家네 is the most popular – I think it’s part of a chain of Korean fast food joints.
It took me a long time to figure out the middle syllable (Kim-ga-ne) because on all the written material associated with the restaurant, they use the Chinese hanja to stand for the “ga.” In pure hangeul, it would be 김가네. I don’t know why they use the hanja – it’s a strictly stylistic thing, but I never knew how it was pronounced as I have never managed to develop the skill required to search for Chinese hanja in dictionaries without already knowing the pronunciation. I had to wait to overhear some coworkers talking about it to make the connection with the bags and containers I saw from the place. “Kim-ga” means, roughly, Kim Family, and the -ne suffix means something akin to the way “chez” works in French, for example.
Day: February 3, 2009
Caveat: 25 random things (cross-post from facebook to blog)
I've been spending more time in facebook, recently. I'm not going to make much effort to "cross-post" things between the two places, but the potential for a sort of "online personality divergence" makes me weirdly uncomfortable — I'm not sure to what extent my miniscule blog audience overlaps my miniscule facebook audience…
Anyway, in this instance, here is a cross posting from facebook. A challenge is circulating there, to post 25 random things about oneself. Here is what I wrote:
1. I like making weird lists of random facts about myself. So this task
should go well and prove entertaining.
should go well and prove entertaining.
2. I jokingly tell people that I'm on my 6th career, and it definitely won't be
my last. Let's see… in reverse order: 6) Elementary EFL Teacher 5) Database
Programmer and Business Systems Analyst (maybe that's 2 at once?) 4) High
School Spanish Teacher 3) Graduate Student (that's a career, isn't it?) 2)
Bookstore Flunky 1) US Army Mechanic 0) Itinerant Hippie-Type-Person
3. I wrote a doctoral dissertation proposal on Cervantes' under-appreciated
novel "Persiles," but I dropped out of the Univ of Pennsylvania program in
disgust with the departmental politics; they gave me an MA as a "consolation
prize."
4. In 2004 I wrote a "temporary" computer program that a former employer of
mine used to bill a Very Large Customer (let's say they have corporate HQ in
Detroit, and the monthly billing amount was approximately $1 million, with
invoices running to 300 pages). As far as I know, they were still using that
program in 2007. When you log onto the intranet site that runs the billing
program, I had placed a quote by Mao Tse-tung on the splash page. It's still
there.
5. My television is broken. I like it that way. I use it to pile up my "half
clean" laundry… the stuff it's not time to wash but that isn't clean enough
to hang in the closet. If I need video, I watch it on my laptop.
6. I'm a language geek. I have studied 20 languages in some kind of academic
context for at least a few months. That doesn't mean I can speak them. In
most, I can barely say "hello, howareya?" In no particular order: Latin,
Ancient Greek, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Russian, Dakota (Native
North American Language), Mapudungun (Native South American Language), Korean, Medieval Welsh, Ancient Sumerian, Georgian (Kartuli), Japanese, Mandarin, Arabic, Purepecha (Tarascan, Native Mexican Language), Dutch, Catalan, German.
7. The languages in which I could truly claim any degree of competence are (in rapidly descending order): English, Spanish, French, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Italian… from there, don't even bother. I claim fluency only in English and Spanish.
8. I cook a mean mole poblano (famous Mexican Puebla style "chocolate chicken"). I haven't done so since moving to Korea, though. Ingredients hard to come by…
9. I love snow and rain much more than sunny days of any kind.
10. I died on November 17th, 1998, from intentional drug overdose. This is my 10th year as a ghost on planet Earth. I'm much happier as a ghost.
11. I love my family, though I don't communicate much with them.
12. I really want to learn Korean for 3 reasons: 1) the challenge — it is reputably one of the most difficult languages in wide distribution to learn 2) the novelty — it is very unique grammatically in the world 3) for my nephews (two Korean boys my sister adopted)
13. My childhood ambition was to be an architect. I feel like it's too late… but is it?
14. I secretly love cheesy romantic comedies.
15. There are still many places I want to travel to and visit. Top of the list: Phillipines, Japan, Mongolia, Vietnam, Indonesia, Finland, Russia, Turkey… uh, well, everywhere. OK? Everywhere.
16. I think I like being a "foreigner" — like when I was living in Mexico, or here in Korea, now. I think it helps affirm my inner alienation.
17. The big surprise of my recent career shift is that I actually enjoy teaching elementary kids more than older kids (and/or adults). It makes sense, but it honestly had never occurred to me before.
18. I own around 4000 books. They're in storage, in Minnesota. Except for, say, the most recent 50, lying around my apartment here in Ilsan. I can't seem to get rid of books, even if they're in a language I may never be competent to read.
19. If I go back to grad school, it won't be in Spanish Lit (which is what it was before). Maybe back to Linguistics?
20. I have more than 6000 music tracks on my computer. I admit… I'm a pirate. Argh.
21. I used to hate kimchi… but dang, that stuff kinda grows on you.
22. The place I've lived longest is Humboldt County (first 17 years minus a
half year in Oklahoma City plus a half year or so in 1990). 2nd runner-up is
Twin Cities, Minnesota (about 10 years cumulatively). 3rd place is Los Angeles
County, various locations (about 9 years total); 4th place is Metro
Philadelphia (about 3 years). 5th place is Northwest Gyeonggi Province, South
Korea (now about 2.5 years cumulatively). 6th place is Mexico City (about 14
months total). Other places where I've lived at least 3 months: Chicago,
Illinois; Valdivia, Chile; Boston/Cambridge, MA; Acuitzio, Michoacan, Mexico;
Quetzaltenango, Guatemala; Craig, Alaska; Oklahoma City, OK; Fort Jackson, South Carolina
23. Technically, I'm a widower. The real story is more complicated — we were
separated and discussing divorce when Michelle committed suicide in June of
2000. But I miss her nevertheless.
24. I have a stepson, Jeffrey, who is now 22 and a student at St Cloud State
in Minnesota.
25. An old friend of mine, Rosita (now 71), in Mexico City in 2007, asked me
why I'm single. "Porque todavia creo en el amor verdadero," I answered. (I
still believe in true love).
Caveat: I’m very uuuu.
My student Jenny K. said this today, as if it had a specific and important meaning: "I'm very uuuu." I have no idea what she meant, but it was very funny.