Korean Job Discussion Forums

HardyandTiny · Joined: 03 Jun 2003

You can't expect the same things from Jenny the server in Chicago; the fashion design student who's barely making ends meet. And Jeeyun the 42 year old veteran server in Seoul who just "makes it happen".
Service is a big part of the Korean dining experience, and it must be very difficult to recreate that in a place like the USA.

Just because a few pansy North Korean sympathizers got a bug up their butt doesn't mean we need to start attacking Korean-Americans. They are for the most part good people. The food is also good and I'm sure that in the near future Korean restaurants will do very well in the USA.

lush72 · Joined: 18 Aug 2003 Location: I am Penalty Kick!

HardyandTiny · Joined: 03 Jun 2003

Son Deureo! · Joined: 30 Apr 2003

g-ese · Joined: 21 Feb 2004 Location: Busan

I don't know where you people found these restaurants, but I never ate Korean food until I got here. I had never met a Korean until college, 21+ years old. I grew up in the midwest. Not many Koreans there I guess. I even lived in Seattle for a while after high school, and still never met any Koreans. My image of Korean food was, Kimchi and rice. Most Koreans I had heard about were either restaurant owners or salon owners. I had heard that Koreans had crappy attitudes. But the Koreans I met in college were nice, save a few. So I dismissed that.

Koreans seem to get upset, or even laugh at you if you don't know or understand their culture. But I say, get off your ass and promote it abroad! Don't laugh because I'm not fluent in your language or well-versed in your cuisine! This is something that these people don't seem to realize. Recently, the more fluent I become and the more adept I am at ordering, the less they laugh. Actually, they don't laugh at all. But I still get angry when I see blogs online about foreigners being laughed at because they are new to Korea. No one wants to be laughed at. Way to help bring in more tourism.

I love Korean food. But Wylde's comments got me thinking about cleanliness. There are times when I see Koreans doing questionable things in restaurants. Like using a cloth to clean multiple areas. Or coughing on stuff. Little stuff like that. It is the little stuff that makes me wonder about the big stuff going on behind the scenes. I have seen roaches on the floor and hair in my food. But, I have been to places like China, where they spit on the floor, piss and shite in the streets and Indonesia (not Bali) where there are roaches EVERYWHERE and the food absolutely sucked. So after that, a little lack of cleanliness doesn't bother me. But it occasionally raises my eyebrow.

coolsage · Posted: Fri Apr 09, 2004 7:45 am Post subject:

I've had similar discussions with students of the 'advanced', traveled kind. The subject of 'chicken' and its preparation came up. I opined that chicken is not a western food per se, that chicken is known and eaten universally. The response was that before westerners began to arrive on these shores, that chicken was prepared in only one way: slap the bird in a pot and boil the beejeezus out of it. (Apparently the Dakalbi came along later.) By way of contrast, one can order chicken in Thailand every day for a month, and it will be a different recipe every time. Korea: the land where imagination comes to die.

matthewwoodford · Joined: 01 Oct 2003 Location: Location, location, location.

Korean food isn't easy for everyone to like at first but it becomes addictive. I never thought I'd be happy to eat it every day at first but now I am. I also, unlike Wylde, admire the way everything gets used in Korean cooking: modern disdain towards intestines or the tops and leaves of vegetables is wasteful and irrational. If only Koreans would do some marketing to promote their cuisine it would be a lot more popular. It could be marketed as healthy, natural and different. But right now it's true you pay over the top prices for some pretty average examples of Korean cooking. In London you have to pay extra for kimchi!

tokki · Joined: 26 Jul 2003

coolsage · Posted: Sat Apr 10, 2004 7:18 am Post subject:

tokki · Joined: 26 Jul 2003

JW · Joined: 06 Feb 2003

I actually made Korean food in the States. I was in college and very broke. I bought some noodles and then took a look in my fridge and went to work. I found a hot dog, an egg and a carrot. I boiled the noodles and the egg, chopped up the meat and carrot then put it all together. I added an offensive amount of seasoning and I had myself a good Korean meal minus the Kim Chi. I even ate it from the pot on the floor with a bit of booze. Good times!

shawner88 · Joined: 01 Feb 2003

Mashimaro · Joined: 31 Jan 2003 Location: location, location