I don’t know about you, but sometimes in Korea, I forget to look up. Case-in-point: MONGLIT (pronounced Mong-Lee) on the fourth floor, next to the Daehan CGV in Seomyeon, near Judie’s Taehwa. I blame the cold winter weather that we’ve had till recently. In the colder months, we would emerge from the metro, heads down, to plow ahead to go to our pre-decided spots. Now that the weather has gotten nice, I can afford to expose my neck and face. Now it’s like Christmas morning; so many treasures (bars) above the second floor!

Monglit is pretty amazing. It’s one of those places that makes you feel like you’ve left Korea and landed in… well, I don’t know. Somewhere AMAZING. Cozy grottoes with pillow-seating on the floor line the outside walls, made all the more intimate with string curtains blocking the entrance. There’s a nice looking bar in the middle of the place too, if you prefer to sit on stools. The music playing is appropriate for the atmosphere. Jazzy piano and Brazilian music played during the hour-and-a-half that we were there. Amazingly, not one K-pop hit crept into the playlist.

Doing a quick count, they have over 50 wines on the list, including a good list of French, Spanish, Chilean, Californian and South African wines. They also have the little diagrams in the menu showing where the wine stands on the dry/sweet spectrum, which, knowing nothing about wine, I greatly appreciated. We ordered the cheapest bottle on the menu, which was a French red sweet wine that was 35,000, and was quite delicious. There were tons of other wines on the list that went well over the 100k mark.

There is also ‘regular’ bar stuff on the menu. Cocktails are around 7k, and bottled beer starts at 4k. There is a food section (anju) of the menu too. It’s all in hangeul, so if you can’t read it, you might be out of luck. They didn’t force us to get any food, which was nice. Just in case, though, we were prepared to order a “potato basket” for 10,000 won.

The service exceeded my expectations too. The waiter was a frickin surgeon with the corkscrew, which I’ve found is a rarity in Korea. He had the bottle open in about 7 seconds. The owner was a sweet lady as well. She must be familiar with Busan Awesome, since she took one look at me and brought out a tortilla pizza as service (ahar-har). Seriously, though: nice people; good service; great atmosphere.

Directions: Seomyeon metro exit 2. Go down three blocks and turn left at the Paris Baguette and Judie’s Taehwa. Monglit is one building past the CGV theater on your right. Fourth floor. They open at 6pm, and I’m not sure when they close.

tortilla pizza! WoOO!

The bar

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About 'Open Mike in Busan'

Introduction

This week’s subject is Lunar New Year. We don’t use a lunar calendar in Western countries, so when I came here it was new to me in some ways, although I had to adjust to the notion of lunar years a long time before.

Family

When I arrived for my first day of studying Computer Science at university I ended up joining the wrong queue – I nearly became an archaeologist – and the Chinese guy in front of me was also a Computer Scientist in the wrong queue. We became friends and I spent most of my university life mixing with the Chinese community – so I became quite familiar with lunar new year celebrations, but it doesn’t make it any less frustrating sometimes because it’s a very family oriented time, and it reminds me that my family are over 5,000 miles away.

I read in a Korean newspaper that 15 million people here are going home for ‘설날’ [Seolnal/Seollal – the Lunar New Year], and it reminds me that – as a foreigner in Korea, married to a Korean – I’m spending my holidays with someone else’s family. Actually, my mother is over 70 now and she’s beginning to think that if I go back every two years she might only see me another three or four times. That’s hard to hear – and I think of that a lot now when we have these regular Korean family gatherings.

But you have to choose to live in one country or the other, and Lunar New Year isn’t as bad as Christmas because it’s just a normal working day in England – I’m not missing out on gift-giving or anything like that. Actually in Korea, 설날 gifts are one of the strange things that I didn’t expect.

Gifts

It’s not that I didn’t expect people to be giving each other gifts, but it’s the type of gifts. For example, before 설날 a couple of years ago, a huge amount of frozen fish turned up in a box at our mother-in-law’s apartment, so it’s not quite like Christmas in England, where you’d never give someone fish or fruit. But in some ways the strangest gifts are the ones in the stores, I have to admit that I find them quite bizarre sometimes.

Part of it is a cultural thing. Here I see big gift boxes of SPAM for example, and in England SPAM was traditionally viewed as a rather low-class meat product. I suppose you might describe it as ubiquitous – but not everything which is ubiquitous is good – the ‘flu virus is ubiquitous but it doesn’t mean you want to have it. [I admit – I’m sick of hearing the popular Korean-English marketing word ‘ubiquitous’ here and now I’m just getting my own back.] In fact, one of the reasons junk email is called spam is because of a British comedy sketch [Monty Python of course - video] which just repeats the word “spam” over and over annoyingly. So you don’t buy people gift boxes of SPAM in England. The other gift that really sticks in my mind is the bulk anti-calculus [you read that right] toothpaste box. If someone bought me toothpaste for a gift, I might think it meant my breath smells.

Various Lunar New Years

One Lunar New Year here, we had a very long day. We started out with the special New Year’s breakfast of rice soup (떡국) – I was told it was at this point my Korean age advanced by one year. I find this whole business of lunar ages really confusing as well, and Korean ages always seem to make me older than I actually am and that’s just not good news, is it? Then we went out, and even though I’d read foreigners warning each other to stock up on food before 설날 because all the shops would be shut, I still found the fact that all the stores really were closed surprising, considering how everything’s open every other day of the year. It really tells you what a big event it is. Anyway, we went out to hike up a mountain to a series of temples to make offerings. As a non-Buddhist, visiting temples is an interesting experience, but it’s not a religious obligation for me, although I seem to end up participating in the rituals, which is quite strange.

After visiting the temples, usually there’s some time then before the family gathering in the evening, although one year we spent the afternoon with my mother-in-law’s sister. She’s a Buddhist fortune teller so I call her my ‘psychic aunt’. She performed some Buddhist new year rituals, including chanting in front of the shrine in her house. It was quite beautiful actually. And then she read our fortunes, which was quite frightening in a way because – apparently – she is very, very good. Even though I’m not a Buddhist, I’ve heard enough to not completely dismiss the power of her fortune telling.

Seollal

So my mother-in-law usually hosts the family gatherings in the evening, which means my wife often helps her mother prepare food – and I don’t – so I feel like I’ve slipped into a typical Korean husband’s role sometimes. Of course, we have all the big bows to go through to show respect to our elders, and the money gifts along with the ‘imparting of wisdom’ speech or ‘advice’ afterwards, which is quite strange when you’re in your thirties. Nothing quite like that happens in England, although I guess parents still lecture you – it’s just that there’s not a specific date they do it on.

I think there can be a general atmosphere of tension on 설날, especially in our mixed Christian and Buddhist family. My wife’s uncle, who’s a Christian pastor, said he tries to celebrate 설날 is a ‘Christian way’, but I’m not sure what that means. I’ve also leaned though how food can really bring people of different backgrounds together over the dinner table. Of course, food is so important in Korea, so I soon discovered that on the 15th day after the start of the new year there’s another special breakfast for Jeongwol Daeboreum (정월대보름), and a special festival - ‘The Burning of the Moon House’ - 달집태우기 – on Dadaepo Beach here in Busan.

The Burning of the Moon House and Audience

I went to the Burning of the Moon House last year. I understood that the 15th day is traditionally when evil spirits are cast out. I find it odd though that the new beginning can’t just begin on the first day like it does with a Western new year.

I gathered that it’s important that the bonfire burns all the way through, because if it does this indicates a good harvest, and if it doesn’t then there won’t be one. But maybe that makes people a little too enthusiastic about designing them to burn ferociously. We weren’t that close to the fire, but before long burning ash and rubbish started falling quite heavily on us, and the organisers were rather urgently shouting over the speakers “Move away! Move away!” It was quite chaotic but it certainly did help chase me away – so I guess it really does cast out evil spirits.

Links
Busan e-FM
Inside Out Busan

Air date: 2011-02-02 @ ~19:30

Maybe it is because I didn't have six classes as usual today or that spring is here. I am sure there is a reason but whatever it is I feel really satisfied with my job in Korea, right now. It's the fourth job and I suppose after many trials and errors I have come to a point where I like my work. I wasn't trained to be a teacher but I feel I have learned and survived through enough that I am capable of the job.

I guess it could be that the kids are transitioning out of their kindy-selves and into first graders. Really, though I feel like this job suits me and I am starting to enjoy being in a room full of feisty children. One thing though that has really helped is that I don't do any coteaching anymore. I don't have to worry about coordinating things with someone who doesn't understand me and won't take the time to try.

Anyways, I want to send a message out there to other teachers in Korea who feel like they can't do this job well. That message is to keep going and know that eventually you will master the art of teaching young Koreans English. I have always thought deep inside myself that I really couldn't do this kind of work, but nowadays I feel I can. So can you!

Image courtesy homesicktexan.com

1 cup of rice
2 cups of chicken broth (bouillon cubes)
1 tablespoon of butter
1 tablespoon of olive oil
1 small onion, diced
4 cloves of garlic, minced
1/4 cup of tomato paste (I would start with a little less and work up to taste)
1 tablespoon of lime juice
1/2 cup of cilantro (if you want it... nicedeli.com)
1 tablespoon of cumin (You can use less if you prefer, I just like the flavor.)
Salt to taste

Method:
1. Add rice, chicken broth and butter into a pot.
2. Bring to a boil on high, stir once and cover.
3. Simmer on low for 20 minutes, then remove from heat and keep covered for 5 to 10 minutes longer. (If you have a rice cooker.... you can cheat with that)
4. Meanwhile, in a skillet, cook onions in oil for 10 minutes or until just about to brown.
5. Add garlic to pan and cook for one minute. Stir in tomato paste and cumin and cook for one minute.
6. Mix in cooked rice, lime juice and cilantro, and season to taste.
Serves 4-6
Notes: Can add fresh peas, diced carrots and/or chopped Serrano or jalapeno chiles.

Courtesy homesicktexan.com