Seoul food and the DMZ

So my little sis was actually getting married to a real live Korean. Up until now I had only seen them on TV and I just thought it was some trick of computer animation. Nope, I was totally wrong! They've got a whole country! I arrived in Seoul on December 23. My entire family flew in for a bit of Seoul searching (these puns won't end so get ready). Immediately we set out to get some Seoul food.



Korea's food is incredible. For those of you who haven't had a chance to eat some Korean food here's how it works. You go to a restaurant and oftentimes sit on the floor around a low table which will usually have a grill or pot built right into it. Immediately, the waiters bring out your panchan (I'll misspell all Korean words, my apologies to the non-computer-generated Korean people out there). Panchan is composed of a ton of little bowls of food that is intended to be eaten before, during, and after the main meal. Usually these are varieties of kimchi. The cabbage kimchi that most Americans know is only one variety of kimchi. Really Koreans tend to kimchi anything: radish, pickles, lettuce, sprouts, etc. One time I thought I had a kimchi finger, but it turned out to be octopus. Generally, there are about 6 bowls of panchan at a given meal. Then the main course comes which is generally pork or beef based. Much of the time you'll grill or boil this at your table and then wrap the meat in fresh lettuce leaves. Sesame is especially good. Here is the clan eating some Seoul food (two of the folks are Laura's friends).

Here we are eating some stuff which name I can't remember. It was the only chicken we ate in the 11 days we were there. Plus, bonus, we have non gender specific aprons on. There's my Mom, Sister and betrothed.
Then here are the bros.

Koreans are serious about their Kimchi, honestly they rarely even smile when they talk about it (so serious are they). You could also say it's Gimchi because K's and G's are interchangeable and the sound is somewhere between the two, thus some of you actually drive a Gia. Here I am beside the latest craze, a Kimchi refrigerator. It's so huggable isn't it?

One of the coolest and most poignant activities we did in Seoul was to head up to the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) between North and South Korea. This has to be done through the military, specifically the Joint Services Organization which is a mixture of US and South Korean military. We left Seoul at 7AM and drove up to a fort on the border of the DMZ. There they gave us all a briefing and also required that we sign our lives away in the event of any occurrence from "enemy" activity. The DMZ extends the entire width of the Korean peninsula and averages 4 km wide (that narrow red line in the middle of the peninsula). Normally nothing lies within the DMZ except at the spot where the tour went. There are two villages that are located within the DMZ on either side of the central Military Demarcation Line (MDL). We were specifically instructed not to take pictures of the South Korean village as we drove by it, I imagine for their protection.

The residents are guarded 24/7 by the JSA and have strict curfews and have heavily subsidized, tax-free incomes ($80k USD per year) along with other perks. On the North Korean side there is the "Propaganda village", so named because it has loudspeakers the size of a house pointed at South Korea that, until 2004, used to broadcast communist propaganda for up to 12 hours a day. There's also the huge flagpole you can see there that's over 500 ft tall flying a massive North Korean flag. Funny thing is, nobody actually lives in this village. Funny commies.

The weather was blisteringly cold, rivaling the sentiment that this picture illustrates. This is by far the closest point of contact with North Koreans.



About 5 buildings here straddle the MDL. The North Korean soldiers stand in profile against a raised concrete divider about half a foot tall between the two sides. You can see the South Korean JSA soldier (who looks like the T1000 from Terminator 2 (you know, when he was posing as a traffic cop?)) interminably staring across the border at the North Korean guards. The guard in the lower photo stands half blocked by the building so the North Koreans can't get a direct shot in the event of an attack. In the building to the left is where the talks occur between nations.



North Koreans and South Koreans alternately use this building for the tour (we had to wait while a North Korean tour finished before we could go in). The microphones on this table are directly on the MDL,



so crossing to the other side of the room lands you squarely within North Korea. Here's me in North Korea:



These guards are like ninjas so we were warned not to get too close. They stay dead still and stare straight ahead wearing these sunglasses even indoors. It must take a lot of heart to do what they do. I mean, I've got seoul, but I'm not a seouldier.

As I mentioned, there are supposedly tourist groups from North Korea that come to the same place, the "tourist group" however that waylayed our tour was just this group of North Korean guards. They were laughing and taking pictures of each other. Then they perched on top of their guard building and watched us like "The Birds". With all the show of the North Koreans I kind of wondered if perhaps they were just instructed to act happy and carefree in the face of all these westerners.

Despite my joking, the feeling produced in all this really is just sadness. My new brother in law, Jeong, spent some of his mandatory 2 year military term guarding the DMZ. He told me that after the death of Kim Il Sung (former premier of North Korea and father of Kim Jong Il) several years ago all the South Koreans were so excited because they thought that a reunification was finally going to occur. It seems that the true sentiment, at least from the South Korean side, is not one of hostility but a great sense of loss and a keen longing to become one again. At least, that's what Jeong explained has been taught to them since grade school. Later that evening we all watched a South Korean movie, "Joint Services Organization" that tells a fictionalized story of the friendship that developed between a group of South and North Korean border guards. Again these feelings were portrayed.

It's hard to reconcile the fact that 23 million North Koreans are kept from their brothers by the pride and stubborness of just a few men. Take for instance the little pot bellied-pig Kim Jong Il or "Dear Leader" as he likes himself to be called. His desire to live up to the profile of his father has caused him to adopt a "Military First" philosophy that is forced down the peoples' throats instead of the rice and nourishment for which they are starving. All the while he sits aboard his yacht or dabbles in failed movie making with kidnapped South Korean actresses. Unfortunately the people are taught that they are the envy of the world, and how should they know better with banned internet, cell phones, and a controlled media? They are taught to deify the Kims; we were told that there are approximately 25,000 statues of Kim Il Sung alone in North Korea. The little pot-bellied pig is going to have to commission a lot of statues and kidnap a few sculptors to be able to keep up with that. Looking at North Korea's horizon, I don't know if we can see any difference for a while...












So this blog entry will obviously end on a somber note. I'll have a few more entries dedicated to Korea, including the traditional Korean wedding and New Years in downtown Seoul!