Update-a-roo!

A few things to send word about. Firstly, after a few speed bumps, I have my plane ticket! I leave on May 17th at 1:something in the morning and arrive at noon THE FOLLOWING DAY! Sounds odd? Well, here's the math:

-A flight to Korea takes, at its shortest, 12 hours and 40 min.
-I, however, am flying with one stop in Beijing, which is a comparable length, but which adds another leg. Add a 3 and a half hour wait between flights aaaaand...
-another flight of 2 hours from Beijing (that's in China!) to Incheon International Airport, outside of Seoul.
-But wait, don't forget the time difference! Korean Standard time is 16 hours ahead of me currently in California (that's 9 hours ahead of UTC).

That comes out to a total of 34 hours and 10 minutes of my life spent on this flight. I damn well better get something free out of it. I figure the 16 hour difference is like an investment in the bank. When I return, I'll suddenly gain all this time and be able to run around and yell at people, "I'm from the FUTURE!!!" My return will be glorious, await it!

Anyways, yesterday, besides watching Iron Man!!!!, Rachel and I headed out to BKJ, a Korean restaurant that she found off a list of reviewed Korean restaurants online. It was located in downtown L.A., specifically Koreatown, so you know it'll be the real deal. According to her, we were adorable non-Korean Americans, and the owner of the restaurant clearly wanted to adopt us, but I'm a little dubious. We walk in and the place clearly is not frequented often by non-Korean speaking folks such as ourselves, but cool and unphased, we took a seat and surveyed the menu. Luckily, there were short explanations in English under a few of the Korean names, so we weren't completely lost, but then a waitress comes and hands us the Dennys-style menus that are all in English with pictures. We decide on our foods (I get the yookgaejang, a beef stew with vegetables and noodles, and Rachel gets the hae-mul pajeong, a pancake with scallops and such. She doesn't eat pork and it was pretty much the only thing that didn't have any, since, hilariously, every dish seemed to include bacon!) and the waitress takes off.
But we can't stop there! What about the drinks? So we both awkwardly walk to the front where they have two refrigerators full of beverages. We look for a little while, until the waitress comes to the rescue. We order up some soju, which we later get several lessons on drinking. First, we're given shot glasses, simple enough: a nice, cool sipping beverage. Then one waitress asks if we want lemon, saying that it's better that way. Fair enough, bring it on! Then, some time into our meal, the owner comes out and says she'll make us a soju cocktail, claiming "this is how men drink it". She squeezes a whole lemon into a cup of ice and tops it off with a generous amount of soju and a splash of water, shakes it with a silly little dance, and serves it up. It was pretty tart, but also delicious and refreshing. As a side note, Rachel ended up sneaking the rest of the bottle into the movie theater, where she made a diet Mountain Dew/Soju drink that was actually pretty tasty.
The food was great, and luckily the place was next to empty so there weren't many to witnesses to our no doubt numerous follies in Korean dining. Needless to say, it was a pretty daunting experience and there aren't many times I felt that out of my element. I've been to places where things are written in Spanish, but even then, the letters are recognizable to me and I can sort out enough to get by. But this was a whole new level of foreign, which oddly enough makes me really interested to find out how I can get by in Korea proper. It was good encouragement to learn a bit more before I leave, and I definitely plan on hitting up a few more restaurants before I go (thanks, Rachel!). Also, in case you plan on hitting up a Korean restaurant soon, do yourself a favor and check out this article on dining etiquette. I certainly wish I had, since I was looking around during the whole meal, hoping to find someone to copy off of when I wasn't sure how to eat the side dishes or how to best eat my soup and rice.

Finally, I've been listening to some Korean language podcasts to bone up on some helpful words and phrases. Here's a list of pretty much all I know thus far:

Ahnyong ha seyo = hello
Joeun ahchimineyo = good morning (not used often)
yobosayo = hello (when answering the phone)
gamsahamnida = Thank you
gomapseumnida = Thanks
daedanhi gamsahamnida = Thank you very much.
cheonman-eyo = You're welcome (more literally, It's nothing)
ani-eyo = You're welcome (less formal, like No problem)