Christmas Dinner

Okay so we went to a VIPS restaurant for our company Christmas dinner.

The food was decent if a bit overpriced. But the strange thing about VIPS and other Korean places of business is that sometimes your dinner/shopping will be to the sound of rap music and not muzak. This is awesome because, while chowing down on your 4881234$ steak, you can lodi dodi your head to Slick Rick. It is also awesome because rap deals in subjects that don't usually come up at the dinner table. And they totally don't censor the swear words. For instance, I was in a department store the other day and Lilly Allen's "Smile" came on over the PA. I won't repeat the offending lines here cause this blog is for the children. But I was surprised to hear f-bombs while trying to pick out a reasonably priced cooking pot.

I eagerly await to hear "Straight Outta Compton".

December Field Trip

Yesterday, we took the kids to Homever (A huge, high end, Walmart-type spot) to catch an off-off-off-off-off-off-off off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off-off Broadway production of Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs.

So we get to Homever and we shuttle the kids down to the theater. We (as in the teachers) quickly realize that there are only 5 people in the cast. How are they going to have 5 people play seven dwarfs, plus a Snow White? During the play we only saw (at most) 4 dwarfs at the same time. Most scenes had Snow White chilling with three dwarfs. The answer was actually surprisingly simple and a testament to the outside-the-box thinking that goes on around here.


^{What in the world is a "Dwart"?}

Make stuff up! Can't get seven dwarfs? Invent a new species.

If you break it down mathematically, each actor was playing 1.75 dwarts. Multiply that by 4 and you get 7. Thus proving the sign to be accurate. Once again, math and illogical reasoning come to the rescue.

Here are some reviews by the students:


<sup>I don't want to give anything away but the twist ending astounded me so much I still can't close my mouth!


I loved it! It gets four thumbs up!
What?
Well what ARE thumbs then?


I'm so amped after watching that! I wanna fight! Hey you, let's fight!


Maaaaaaan! Them Dwarts was MAD-fake.</sup>

PS. Bonus for Duncan.

The Heavenly Potato

Back at the end of September, a little entry on Boingboing caught my eye. Knowing that this spiral culinary delight/coronary nightmare was out there, I resolved to eat one as soon as I saw it. Well this past weekend, after weeks of quasi-looking, I found a vendor in 강남(Gangnam). And as with everything of significance I do here, I documented myself eating it. Props go to Ant for holding it down on the camera tip.

Advertising

For some weird reason, Koreans LOVE to advertise. Business, personal, whatever, it's all out there on a banner, or cluttered onto the side of a building, or even on the side of a bus. This was the first thing that struck me when I got here, the visual clutter. I think I mentioned this in a previous post. There's also a belief that if you have English words in your ad, it will be more credible. I saw this ad a while ago on the subway and I thought it was soooo redonkulous, but I couldn't get a picture of it. That is until I saw it again this weekend.

Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you the weirdest, dumbest, most awesome print advertisement EVER!!!!


^{You will poop gold nuggets if you install this in your home}

Yeah, that's a toilet seat cover. Who knew they had such life-changing abilities here? Seriously, that's the most ridiculous claim: buying this item that you're only going to use when performing one of humankind's more unsavory acts (number 1, number 2, number 1.5, puking, which I guess could be referred to as number 3) will make all you dreams come true!?!?! Please.





Yet...I kinda want one...

The social hierarchy.

Disclaimer. The following post is based on my not-at-all-scientific observations and ONE anecdotal story. So take it for what it's worth, which is nothing.

A couple of weeks ago, my friend Dave told me this story. One night in Seoul (or wherever) a young guy was walking home when a drunk middle-aged man got in his face. The confrontation quickly escalated and the drunk old man pulled out a knife. A short scuffle ensued and the young man managed to disarm and immobilize the drunk older man. Weeks (months?) later, the whole thing went to court and the young guy actually ended up paying $4,000 because the old man got injured. What did the drunk middle-aged man get for pulling a gank? NOTHING!!!! Crazy no?

The moral here is that it's fiscally responsible to get stabbed in the gut here in Korea ONLY if your assailant is a middle-aged man.

This story, whether it's true or not, is actually pretty telling of the social hierarchy here in Korea. If you were to picture a ladder-like device depicting the order of importance of various ages and demographics, it would resemble something like this. At the top you would have middle-aged men. They are the kings in Korea, they can pretty much get away with anything short of murder. And sometimes murder also. Then you have the elderly man. He's respected, but too weak to actually yell at you or hit you if you disrespect him. Then there are the middle-aged ladies, they TAKE their respect by being pushy and bossy. Then the elderly ladies. Then everyone else. This, of course is within the Korean community. Foreigners aren't at all even on the social ladder (which is dumb and unfortunate, sorry guys).

Poutine!!!

Check it out!! I found poutine in Korea!!!


<sup>Vive le Quebec! What's up, quoi?!?!


Yeeeeeah!!! Representin' $-Treal!!!!!


The goods</sup>

Okay, okay, the cheese was grated and didn't come in curds. You purists can moan all you want. But when you come here to the other side of the world, you can make it the "right" way. I happen to prefer it with shredded cheese anyways.

By the way, this was at a joint called the Rocky Mountain Tavern in Itaewon (Itaewon = foreignertown). The place was soooo Canadian. They played a rerun of a hockey game on the jumbo screen.

Korean "Winter"

How's my peoples in Canada hanging? You cold yet, suckas?

This is a picture I took on Thursday at lunch.



Yeah, so apart from that one day where it snowed (which happened to be the same day I decided to move from Uijeongbu to Seoul), I haven't seen any of the white stuff.

Yesterday was the work party for November birthdays. Here comes more pictures of kids.








^{Those kids with the paper crowns had "Happy Birthday" written on them.}

Sorry, no jokes today.