An American In Korea: Weirdos Everywhere!

Observations about those weirdo Koreans, made by this weirdo American gyopo:

No milk with rice or your stomach will explode!

My unni told this to me last night when I was eating spicy pork with rice. I was thirsty and headed to the refrigerator. We just bought some soy milk for me and I saw the carton and thought, well, why not? Milk is good for spicy foods! But my unni called me a weirdo for drinking milk while eating rice. Pfft, doesn't she know that she's the real weirdo??

30 C outside, better cover up!

True true some of it is style (right now baggy shirts and tight pants/leggings are super in) but I'll be standing outside sweating like a pig and everyone around me will be fully covered from neck to toe in huge swathes of dark-colored fabrics. What gives? (For those unable to work Google, 30 C is approximately 86 F)

But there is some basis to this! In dry desert heats, you want to wear baggy light-colored fabrics to help shade your skin and provide some relief. Except it does tend to get pretty humid here in Korea, not to mention that the emphasis was on LIGHT colors. So, conclusion? Weirdos!

Vegetables? How do you want them, boiled or spicy?

All the vegetables here are cooked, covered in spice, or both! I want a nice crisp salad sometimes but that never happens. Kimchi is the most famous Korean vegetable ever and I admit it, I do love some delicious radish kimchi served up alongside my rice and meat, but I miss even the crappy Fresh Choices of America... One time my aunt gave me raw cucumbers, and then gave me spicy gochujang sauce to dip them in. I can't win!

I brought this topic up with some of my relatives and they just said, "맛없다~" or, to translate: "it's not tasty."

WEIRDOS.

And let's not even get into my burger cravings here...

French fries with sour cream and onion powder

America! Get on this! This is the most delicious junk food I have ever tasted! Mixing powder with french fries might be kind of a weirdo thing to do, but it's no different from chips, and who cares when the end result is ~amazing~.

Clean, sparkling subways

Sparkling might be something of an exaggeration, but the subways are amazing here. They're so quick and prompt and CLEAN. Speaking as someone whose only experience with subways comes from a few touristy trips to New York, I nearly had a heart attack when I saw how nice the subways are in Korea.

Not to mention, a lot of the subways have little booths and stalls set up for you to buy food or clothes or bags or shoes while on your way somewhere. They're like mini-malls set up underground. We need more of this, stat!

Any other weirdo things that Koreans do that should be added to this list? I'm sure I'll think of more tomorrow when I go back to Seoul, haha.

Peace <3