On Wednesday, August 17, at 7:00pm, I finally landed in South Korea with my mother, who is visiting for a month. The nine-hour flight was gruesomely long; throughout the plane ride, I managed to take a thirty-minute nap, read a whopping two pages of the book I brought (because I was too embarrassed to turn on the reading light, which no one else was using), and win Poker three times (a 100% winning rate!) on the plane's entertainment system. The airport staff first checked our Q-code, which is Korea's COVID-19 protocol system. Although many restrictions (such as the vaccine requirement) have been lifted, COVID-19 is becoming increasingly rampant in Korea again. All individuals arriving in Korea are required to upload a negative COVID-19 test result from 1-2 days before departure and a COVID-19 test result no more than 24 hours after arrival. We were able to get through the airport much quicker than those who did not create a Q-code. After getting our passports checked and picking up our luggage, we met a few members of my mother's side of the family outside the airport. The car ride from Incheon to Dongducheon, their hometown, was nearly two hours long. Catching up with my family in Korea after so long felt like a dream. Because my Korean improved drastically since the last time I visited, I was actually able to converse a bit with them this time. We ordered jokbal (pig's feet) for delivery and then called it a night. For our first item of business for our first official day in Korea, we had to eat! My uncle recommended a budaejjigae restaurant, which immediately resonated with me and my mother. Budaejjigae literally translates into army base stew, which is a spicy stew with ham, sausage, spam, bacon, noodles, and assorted vegetables. My first mouthful of the stew had me ascending to heaven. The broth had a clean, refreshing, and deep taste that is incomparable to any budaejjigae I've had in Hawaii. KOREA FACT: Many restaurants in Korea specialize in only one dish. Therefore, it's common to see restaurants named after the dish it specializes in (e.g., Dongducheon Budaejjigae). Out of curiosity, I looked at the menu and dropped my mouth in shock. Each order of budaejjigae, which serves 2-3 people, was only 9,000 won, which is roughly $7 USD. This means that for our party of five, our two orders of budaejjigae only came out to about $14. In Hawaii, this meal would have easily cost over $30. The theme of me getting surprised at the low cost of living in Korea will be common throughout this blog. The resident number fiascoThe most pressing matter of the day after lunch was getting my COVID-19 test in order to upload a result to my Q-code. My mother already got hers done at the airport's foreigner service for 80,000 won; apparently, I could get the test done for free at a local clinic because I came in as a Korean national. When we arrived at the clinic, the workers took a look at my Korean passport and asked for my resident number, which was missing from the passport. Usually, Korean passports have a resident number (refer to the image below). The clinic refused to give me the COVID-19 test until I provided the number. My mother and I were confused because (1) we didn't know that I needed a resident number to get a COVID-19 test and (2) we didn't know what my resident number was in the first place. We recalled writing it down on one of the forms at the Korean embassy, but all that information was with the embassy and not provided to us. At this point, the Korean embassy in Honolulu was already closed. This is when the panic started to kick in--especially for my mother, who kept bringing up that if we didn't get the test by the 24-hour mark of our arrival in Korea, we would get fined ten million won (~$7,500 USD). There was only a handful of hours left before the 24-hour mark. The clinic workers noticed our panic and suggested we go to a nearby family record center, where the staff could easily look up our family records in the system and provide us with my resident number. We drove to the center in a hurry and explained our situation. To our horror, the worker told us that when she looked up our family record, the box for my resident number was blank. The worker was just as confused as we were and explained that it was the first time she saw such a case and there was nothing she could do. I called my father, who was in Hawaii, to ask him to look for my resident number in my files but he said there was absolutely nothing at home. Grim images of my bank account with $7,500 less started to appear in my head. However, I tried my best to remain calm and look for a solution. I went to the Korean embassy website for Hawaii and found a 24-hour hotline for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs' Consular Call Center. My mother called the hotline and explained the situation again. After a 20-minute back-and-forth, the operator ultimately said, "I am very sorry, we have never come across this situation before. There is nothing else we can do to help you." I felt my sanity on the verge of crumbling at this point, but I had to keep trying. I found another number for emergencies on the embassy website and thought, if this doesn't work out, I truly don't know what to do next. To my relief, we finally received a viable explanation and solution through this emergency number. The individual on the phone explained that I didn't have a resident number because I was in the process of renouncing my Korean citizenship, which will be finalized in a year. To account for this, the embassy had given us an official signed document that explained my situation. All we had to do was show the document to the clinic, and I would be able to take the COVID-19 test without a resident number. Thankfully, I had brought this document with me on the trip. We rushed to the clinic with the document and everything worked out--I was able to get my COVID-19 test. This was certainly an experience that I don't want to go through again. For one, I felt incredibly stressed that I could have paid such a hefty fine. I was also just angry at the circumstances because there was no way I could have known that I was required to provide my nonexistent resident number to get a COVID-19 test that was required of me by law on my first day in Korea. However, it's been such a long time since I was in such a high-stakes situation, and I realized once again that the best course of action during such stressful experiences is to resist the urge to go into panic-mode, take a deep breath, and logically think of the next viable solution, even if the previous methods have failed to work. If you think that things will always work out, your thoughts truly become reality. Eating with Gusto, every. single. time.After going to Korea a few times in my life, I've realized that the highlight of my trips has become centered around one thing: food. Of course, this time is no different. The deliciousness of the food here is elevated even more when I look at the forgiving prices. I've been fortunate to have my relatives suggest matjip (맛집) for me and my mother to try around Dongducheon and other nearby cities like Pocheon and Uijeongbu. Every single recommendation has been successful. I'd like to think that the food in these places outside of Seoul are even better than the restaurants inside Seoul. While eating here in Korea, I've noticed a couple of interesting things. Here's a few of my findings:
Perhaps my most favorite thing that I've noticed about eating in Korea is the many ways for describing food, especially textures. I've been trying to learn ways to describe food in Korean, and I didn't realize there was so much terms. Back in my anthropology class that I took in my freshman year, I remember learning that language largely reflects what is important in a culture; I realized the truth of this because for Korean people, food is clearly an important aspect of Korean culture. Here are some of my favorite phrases:
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