Korean Job Discussion Forums

[paperbag princess]

are there any other veggies out there who've ever had this problem? does anyone know why ham isn't considered to be meat? i can understand when people don't think seafood is meat, but ham?

[peppermint]

Less than a week ago I heard th phrase "Yes, it's vegetarian, there's only ham on it." I thik it's because there isn't an exact translation for meat- just different words for ham and beef and chicken. .

As for why they'd think a vegetarian would eat ham- there are some things in life you simply shouldn't question.

[Pyongshin Sangja]

Meat is gogi in Korean. What it means is open to interpretation. Just like in English. Beef is so-gogi, pork is dwegi-gogi, dog is kae-gogi and human is saram-gogi. Ham is, er, ham. Maybe they think it comes from a tube.

[Swiss James]

There's an english comedy show called "The Royle Family" about a working class family in Manchester- the son gets a girlfriend who comes round for tea but she's vegetarian. The grandma says

"What about a bit of ham, could she have that? It's only wafer thin?"

[uberscheisse]

when i got here i told people "i don't eat meat" straight up.

we'd order food. i'd say "bulgogi? what's that" and they'd say "oh, maybe some beef stew, you try, maybe you like it" (it's the 'maybes' that getcha down. i like things to be definite).

it seems to me that people here think anything outside the traditional korean diet is folly and will do the utmost to make you see the error of your ways, to the point of trying to sneak meat into your dinner.

it can be aggravating.

[paperbag princess]

it's really annoying. people don't get it. i've had people try to put random meat and fish prodructs in my mouth, as if i have no idea what i like to eat...

[the_beaver]

Because they think Spam is ham and Spam isn't really meat anymore.

[djsmnc]

[uberscheisse]

right across the street from my school is the "original spam" restaurant.

no really - it's the real thing - SPAM. your search is OVER, and you only had to come to seoul for closure...

[waggo]

[VanIslander]

"Why don't Koreans consider ham to be meat?"

Not a Jewish question.

I asked my students if ham is meat and they said yes. I think they understand 'meat' as animal parts we eat because when I had first introduced the concept to them a few months ago, a few students joked about their classmates as meat, pretending to take a bite out of them!

This reminds me of the very old Chinese lady in a city near Vancouver. She had asked my father and I to help her lift a box into her truck because, as she'd said about her eighty-odd-year-old husband, jokingly: "He has no meat."

As for whether seafood is meat, my students say no. But then again, back home people often distinguish between meat and seafood. "I don't eat meat but I eat fish."

I think the other posters are on the mark when they say it's some form of cultural suasion to get you to eat like them, to adopt their dietary habits and values, instead of insisting on your own.

Anyone who wants to be a vegetarian in Korea needs to read up on the Korean names of dishes and their ingredients. There's a lot of no-meat dishes in Korea, and you can use the search function here at Dave's for suggestions of some.

Good luck with that.