This is the traditional market for Korea. Although supermarkets are plentiful (in fact there is a very large retail department store one block away from us very much like a super Walmart of Target) the traditional markets don’t seem to lack for customers.

I have become a big fan of the market for several reasons. It’s very close – I can walk to the market and get just about any fresh fruit or vegetable without having to drive or – the worst part of driving – park.  I don’t feel the need to stock up on everything – just the things I need for the meal we’ll prepare – so our food is always fresh.  It’s mostly covered, so inclement weather is not problem. And as far as entertainment value, the people watching is always a pleasure.

Suam Market. A traditional Korean market for fruits, vegetables, meat and fish

Vendors line the streets with homegrown veggies and wholesale.
On the left are grains and various legumes that have been milled

A butcher carves pork from the carcass outside his shop.
No refrigeration. This is not your local Albertsons.

But then Albertsons or Kroger won't give your doggies snacks, either

Meat hangs outside another butcher shop, waiting for customers

Not only raw meats, but cooked foods are available. This woman is selling steamed pork knuckles

Another shop sells ready-to-eat foods. A man in a business suit and slippers enjoys a meal

Rice is a staple but can be prepared in many ways. This vendor sells puffed rice in various forms. These are usually consumed as snacks to be served while drinking beer or soju, the national rice wine drink. Most bags sell for about 1000 won, or 1 US dollar.

Many vendors are the old folks who supplement their meager incomes with whatever they have grown in their gardens. This woman is selling sangchu, or lettuce which will be used as wraps for bits of grilled meat common in Korean BBQ

The market rambles around many alley ways and streets and requires some exploring to see it all. This young boy was enchanted by my dogs

Another alley full of shops but devoid of people

Fish, whether it is fresh, still swimming, frozen or dried can be found at Suam Market

Even whale meat can be had, although fresh does not seem to be on the menu.. This shop will serve you a meal or sell you a chunk to take home

SSo far from home, both in location and style, the traditional Korean market provides lots of fresh foods but fun as well.

On May 7th/8th we went to MyeongHee’s mother’s house for “Parent’s Day.” Usually, we just hang around the house, but since it was harvest time for miyuk, mother-in-law was busy for a good portion of the weekend.

Miyuk is a seaweed that figures very prominently in a typical Korean diets. Sometimes, it is merely a side dish that can be prepared in many ways with garlic, red pepper and fish sauce. The most famous, however, is Miyuk Guk – Seaweed Soup. This is a traditional dish for birthdays. Sure, everyone gets a cake on their birthday – but that’s a western tradition that was imported. Koreans also have seaweed soup for breakfast on their birthday. Post-partum women will also eat large quantities of the soup in the first few weeks after giving birth. In fact, after our dog SaTang had her pups she was given several helpings of MiyukGuk and rice to help her recover her strength. I’ve even become a fan of MiyukGuk.

Loaded with vitamins and minerals, seaweeds like Miyuk are very healhful. For those who don’t have relatives on the shore, it can be bought in most stores. About a half-pound will cost about $2.

These pictures below are at the fishing village where MyeongHee’s mom lives. Click on a picture for a larger view

I was babysitting the two and gave them a snack. It was only a short while, but it didn’t take long for trouble to brew. I gave them “Goldfish” graham crackers in non-spill cups.  Then we turned on the DVR for a few minutes of their favorite TV show by far, The Wiggles. While I tried to get the girls to dance, Jillian eats a few of her goldfish and gives the majority to the dog.

Sure, that’s sharing. That’s nice. But when she runs out of goldfish and mean, old Papa Marty won’t give her any more – that’s the real sharing.

Me and My Shadow

Another weekend in PoHang with MyeongHee’s family. This time, instead of making Kimchi, we celebrated the mother-in-law’s birthday. the old girl is 73. She’s doing much better than she was about a year or so ago when she was diagnosed with TB. She’s old, but still hanging on and very active. I guess you have to be in the country side in Korea as there aren’t many conveniences and a majority of her food is grown or caught or fetched by her and her neighbors.

Most of the weekend, GaEun was my shadow. If I went outside, she wanted to go with me. If I stayed indoors and watched TV, she did, too, although she wandered back and forth from the room I was in to the other rooms. Most of them were amazed that in a short time with me she was speaking a few English words, but we all know babies on the cusp of language acquisition pick up new words very quickly. ‘Hi’ and ‘bye’ are almost automatic for her, but I also taught her ‘duck’ and ‘goose’ as one of the neighbors has a pen of both nearby and mother-in-law has a duck statue in the living room.

all bundled up against the cold

It was pretty cold early in the morning, but by 11am or so it had gotten quite warm. She’s still all bundled up in sweatpants and jacket and heavy sweater.  She loved following me around, sometimes playing in the dirt or sand.

While GaEun and I wandered the fishing village, the women-folk prepared for the birthday breakfast. MyeongHee bought a cake in town but everything else was home grown. Mother-in-law in dressed in traditional Korean old woman garb of garish patterns and colors called “azumma style.”  Nothing special about her dressing this way for her birthday as she always dresses this way. As do nearly all the other old women. I’ve often wondered at what point they go from young, modern and stylish like my lovely wife MyeongHee to short permed no-hassle hair and the crazy patterned clothes. Is there a switch that gets turned on at some point? Can it be turned off, or merely delayed?

birthday cake, seaweed soup and raw fish - breakfast of champions.

Koreans make little or no distinction between meals and may have the same thing for breakfast lunch and dinner. We had the birthday cake at breakfast, but we also had what most people would consider dinner and what some would not even consider food.

Clockwise from left: kimchi, bell flower root, mountain weeds, the  traditional birthday dish in Korea of seaweed soup, rice and raw fish covered in onions, hot peppers and garlic.   Mmm mmm good. That’ll get you started in the morning for sure! Oh, and cake.

A woman sifts her crops in a small parcel of land in the the city

I took this picture with my smart phone, so the quality isn’t so great. But I think it shows a distinct part of Korean culture. Where ever there is any open space that is even slightly level, Koreans make a garden. They’ll grow peppers, onions, cabbage, sesame seeds, bell flower, beans – whatever. Rarely does one see grass unless is it part of a public park.  Often, whether to supplement their income or get rid of it before it goes bad, they’ll sit on a street corner and  sell their veggies.

The woman uses the wind to blow away dust and dirt as she throws the grains into the air

One might wonder why her head is all covered. One reason is the sun – Koreans are not fond of getting a tan and prefer whiter, paler skin. Darker skin is for those south Asian types or those that toil in the field. Even on sweltering hot days I’ve seen woemn covered from head to toe to avoid the effects of sun. Another reason, it was cold and windy that day

These people tend this garden 9 months of the year, from preparing it in the spring with tilling and planting to tending during the growing years and then harvesting as she is now. In terms of labor, its not cheap. But if one doesn’t have the cash to buy, its a great alternative.  It’s back breaking work, though. In fact, it’s not uncommon to see an old man or woman permanently bent over 90 degrees due to their labor in the fields. Nothing simple about it.

I see this as a dying element of the culture here. Rarely have I ever seen even a middle aged person farming. Its always old people. The couple that tends this plot next to my home couple is well into their sixties. I wonder who will do this when they’re gone.

Eel fillets grilled next to eel head - and yes, I ate the head

MyeongHee said the tail was especially healthful – something about the long round things that Koreans tend to find good for male power. She said I didn’t particularly need it, but its good anyway.

At first I was reluctant to eat the head. But after grilling, it looked just like any other piece of meat. I ate the skin, the brain, and the eyes – they were hard little marbles and I wasn’t fond of them. But since this type of restaurant doesn’t get many foreigners, there were a few checking out how the foreigner does and I wasn’t going to disappoint them.

Like many Korean restaurants, the side dishes are plentiful. Any they’re bottomless. Eat up all the salad, kimchi, steamed spinach or eggplant and they’ll bring you more. It’s always a colorful dinner with lots of various flavors here.

Ban Chan, or side dishes, abound in Korean restaurants

I got stuffed. I was driving so I didn’t get to drink any beer. But MyeongHee drank a few glasses. I like a girl who can swill beer. This was my first time in an Eel restaurant. After almost five years here, there are still surprises to be found.

There is a look that says I have had a beer or two

This is I think the 6th wedding I’ve been to here. Stranger and stranger every time. Again, no one shuts up and they talk all through the ceremony. Again, they bring out the cake during the ceremony, cut it and then put it back, never to be seen again. I’ve never eaten cake at a Korean wedding, although there always is one and they always cut it – just a single cut, no pieces. It’s possible the bride and groom take it home after, but I’m betting it’s merely symbolic and entirely inedible. Who the hell knows.  Half the people left during the ceremony in order to get a good seat at a table for the buffet. Then they eat and run.  Very strange.  I got a little nostalgic for a good old American wedding with a band, dancing, toasting, eating of cake and all that goes with it.

And then I ate at the buffet and that cheered me up.

Korean buffets are nearly always the same. Sure, there’s a few dishes that stand out that the other guys don’t have, but not many. This one made me laugh. For one, it was the only dish in the entire buffet with a label – 40+ dishes – and only one labelled. And I was the only foreigner in the place.  Dozens of weddings, hundreds of Korean guests dining at the buffet and there’s a single English sign and it’s badly done. They obviously didn’t type out the English just for me. For who, then, since 99.99% of those attending can read Korean? Hell, even I can read the Korean label above the horrid English.  No one needed it, but someone, somewhere in the bowels of the stadium kitchen decided to butcher English while he was butchering the Chikin.

When I saw the sign, standing all on its own, with its spelling that reminded me of Arkansas i simply had to take a picture. So, sure it’s fuzzy and slightly out of focus.  I had a plate of grub in my other hand.

I sat down with MyeongHee and her friends and proceeded to eat while I mused about the backwoods speller they somehow employed here.  The “Chikin” spelling I can almost forgive. It is phonetically correct. But “lag” was just too Bubba for me. MyeongHee wondered what I was smiling about as I nibbled the beef ribs and shrimp stir fry that are buffet staples.  She’d been to Oklahoma and understood the hill-billy drawl I put on the label – we’d made fun of a few of the woodsey folks we saw at the Casino across the Red River in 2009. It wasn’t as funny to her as I thought it was so I dropped it. Then I ate the chikin.

I realized then that “lag” wasn’t simply a spelling error. The chikin was horribly tough and stringy. I think “lag” meant these were the slower, nearly dead birds they could catch. The ones that lagged behind the rest of the coup when Bubba was chasing down a quota to be slaughtered.

Today, MyeongHee and I went to Busan to go to Costco for some American food like cheese, cheerios and sour cream (I could use a few packets of Ranch Dip sent by the way.)  We went with two of her hair shop friends who stocked up on things themselves. All along the way, all three of them would Ooo, Ahh and Ypuda (Korean for pretty) as we drove through the mountains and passed cherry trees, pear orchards or wild red-buds in bloom. It was kind of funny – a musical accompaniment to the iPod I had playing on the stereo.

On our way back, we stopped at a galbi restaurant. That’s a typical Korean tradition – when friends go out together as the 3 girls did, dinner is on the agenda. I love galbi. Knowing nothing of  Korean cuisine back in 2004, it was the first meal I had as the school director took us all out to welcome me and say farewell to the teacher I was replacing. I fell in love with Korean food that night.  Today as we ate, I thought of just how different galbi is from the western diet I still crave (and spent large amount of money on today to sustain my habit of .)  It’s not just the ingredients themselves that are different, but the manner in which it is cooked and eaten.

Traditional Korean galbi is marinated, fatty pork strips grilled right at the table. A few of my close friends in Dallas as well as my two daughters have had it from a restaurant in K-town in Dallas. Only slightly different due to availability of the same types of lettuce and garlic, the Chosun Korean BBQ on Royal Lane just east of Harry Hines in Dallas is pretty close.  The beauty of galbi is the interactivity of the meal. One doesn’t simply consume a plate of meat, veggies and rice, but must actively participate in its creation. As the strips of pork are cooked, they are cut with a kitchen shears into bite-size pieces. Once cooked, a piece of meat is placed on a single leaf of lettuce (anything but iceberg will do.)  Most Koreans put a slice of raw garlic on it next, but some, like me, like their garlic singed a little on the grill. Then a red paste mixture of beans and red pepper is added to it. Depending on the side dishes served, and Koreans usually have numerous to choose from, one can add those to the lettuce as well. I like the marinated onions. Once you have all the meat, garlic, paste and veggies you want in your lettuce, wrap it all up and stuff it – it should be a large wad – into your mouth.   This shit rocks!  It’s a little spendy in Dallas, but here in Korea we can feast for cheap – four of us left full-bellied for less than $40, including beer.

So, for those of you who perhaps one day will come to visit me here, you’ll get your own royal treatment and be shown all the intricacies and niceties of Korean dining. We’ll feast on all that is well and good in Korean kitchens. For those of you who will likely never come visit (I’m not naming names), go eat some galbi and toast me while you eat. In Dallas, Chosun BBQ is best.  Chicago has it’s own K-town and there are likely numerous spots there to try it. South Dakota?  Not likely but there may be something.