Taylor Kuchera
COMM 3451W
Intercultural Experience Blog
3-8-2013
Traditional Korean
Royal Cuisine & Popular Street Foods
In the
early 1950’s, the first significant amounts of Korean’s were recorded to settle
in Minnesota due to the Korean War. It wasn’t until after the American
Immigration law was passed when Korean’s population flourished and soon became
the largest immigrating population in Minnesota by 1971. At that time, it was
safe to say that Korean’s could finally call Minnesota their “home.”
Integrating cultures was not easy, having such a different language, way of
dress, and religion. But one way that every person could bond over was food.
Although Korean’s have a very different style of food than here in America, one
can never go wrong with a little rice, meat, and vegetables, no matter what the
dish. This short, hour-long session named, “Traditional Korean Royal Cuisine
& Popular Street Foods,” was filled with information about favorite
traditional Korean dishes. But not only was the information about the history
of Korean Cuisine interesting, but also the way that the people attending the
session behaved and interacted with one another.
On Monday,
March 4th, I attended this session, “Traditional Korean Royal
Cuisine & Popular Street Foods,” held on the third level of Coffmann Union.
After first reading the description of the session, I thought that it would be
more of a meet and greet type session where one could come and go as they
please. So, I was just planning on walking around the room for a little bit,
observing the different people attending the session as well, and trying
different kinds of foods as I did so. But as I turned the corner and peeked my
head into the conference room in which it was held, a bright smiling face
greeted me with excitement. I was the first one to arrive, 10 minutes before
the start of the session. I was shocked, but entered, hoping I wasn’t going to
be the only one there. Seongdok Kim, a Ph.D. candidate and the presenter for
the session, ceased from wildly clapping her hands only to enthusiastically
shake my hand, her smile still beaming at me. She quick hit me with a game of
twenty questions, asking me my name, major, what brought me there, and several
more, all the while more people slowly continued to trickle in. As each person entered
the room, she gave them each the same eager greeting she had given me and I
became to feel much more comfortable, gradually transforming into the
nonexistent wallflower.
By the time
the presentation began, I was one of three Caucasian people, but the only one
that couldn’t speak a lick of Korean. I definitely felt like the outsider of
the room, especially because no one wanted to sit by me. Everyone sat in groups
with their friends, all of the same race. As Kim moved the presentation along,
people constantly were coming and going as they pleased. I found myself getting
very irritated as I sat there, trying to watch the many YouTube videos Kim
showed us about Korean Cuisine. I was amazed that even though she was the one
presenting and people were interrupting her time, she still stopped to greet
each one of them with a friendly smile, bow, offer them some food and ask them
to sit down wherever they please. She did not seem phased by the fact that
people seemed to have no sense of time or respect whatsoever.
I’ve got to
admit, although it wasn’t the most interesting event I’ve ever sat through, Kim
seemed very excited about the topic, so I sat there with a smile on my face and
let her ramble on and on about the many different kinds of foods that Korean’s
know and love. I mean, who doesn’t love to learn about food? Plus, as we
listened, we also got to try some of the foods that they consider to be “Picnic
foods.” I tried a Vegetable Dumpling and a Korean Roll known as, “Gimpop.” They
were both very good, but both only contained a lot of vegetables. As an
American, I’m not used to eating only a bunch of vegetables. I love my meat and
fried things.
(Vegetable Dumpling (left), Gimpop (right))
But as she went on, I learned that not everything Korean only
contains vegetables. The basis of their food items is meat or seafood, rice and
vegetables. Their meals usually contain an array of five different colors; red,
green, yellow, black and white. After eating a Jimmy John’s sandwich only made
of turkey, white American cheese, and mayo on a white baguette in front of one
of my Mom’s friends, I will always remember now that “The more color in a meal,
the more nutritious it is.” So I was impressed by how nutritious every one of
their meals were, even without being only vegetables all the time. We learned
about the Royal Korean Cuisine and how the King was fed and treated. He was the
only person to receive 12 side dishes along with his main course. The Royal
Cuisine was based off of traditional banquets, so most foods were very mild
tasting, whereas today, their foods tend to be much more on the spicy side. I
found myself giggling very slightly in my head because as Kim presented food
after food to us, they never really seemed that different. All of them
contained a meat or seafood item of a sort, rice and vegetables; it never
failed. But even as Kim called on people in the room to share their experience
with each food, they treated each item as an individual. The one part where I
was really thrown off was during one of the YouTube videos. We were learning
about a popular street food known as Pancake Hotteoke. This pancake is a deep
fried ball of noodles and vegetables that can be found in stands all along the street.
But before someone bit into the golden brown ball of goodness, I found myself
thinking, “Oh my gosh, YUM! A chocolate doughnut or something!” And as the
camera videotaped someone biting into it and showing us what was inside, I just
laughed and shook my head at myself. “So American,” I laughed, and continued
watching with a less biased mindset. Deep-fried or not, this tradition of
Korean Cuisine has been going on for over 5,000 years and is something that
they are very proud of.
(Bi-Bim-Bap, colorful traditional dish)
(Pancake Hotteoke)
After
sitting through this session and reflecting back on it later, I can recognize
several different patterns that occurred specific to the Korean culture. One
main one was their sense of Collectivism. As a collectivistic culture, one
thinks not of itself, but of others. Especially in the light of the instructor,
Seongdok Kim, she really made an effort to include absolutely everyone. She
would reach out to each one of us, asking us for own personal experiences. This
is incredibly collectivistic because in that type of culture, each person is
encouraged to be an active participator in society. So by Kim calling on each
one of us by name to share our own experiences really brings everyone together
as a whole and makes each of us feel like a group, rather than a bunch of individuals.
Because Kim continuously called on me by name, I started to feel much more
comfortable, like she was already one of my good friends. Then because I was
feeling more comfortable, I was much more likely to open up and share with the
class. I learned a lot about each one of the people that attend the session and
really felt like apart of the group by the end. Like I said before, I
definitely felt like the outsider, being the only one who was not fluent in
Korean. But because of the collectivistic culture that Kim brought to the
session, that wallflower soon became an active participator in the discussion.
One part of this collectivistic culture that I feel crossed a line with me was when she asked me for my phone number. When I first arrived to the room, she was asking me several questions to get to know me better. We talked about the basics such as my name and major, but then got on the topic of hockey. I was telling her how I was going to the Boys High School State Hockey Tournament this coming weekend and she got very excited. She told me how she always had wanted to go to a Gopher hockey game and asked me if I went to those. I confirmed this quickly because hockey is my favorite sport, so of course I go to all the Gopher games! When I said that she quickly whipped out her phone and said, "Here! Give me your number please so I can contact you about going to a game!" I felt terrible saying no to her, so I involuntarily took the phone and put my number in it, feeling very uncomfortable all the while. I feel like this was just an act of collectivism for her because it's okay to all be connected. We're all friends now that we've met, so it's okay to know personal information too. In a way, I feel like there is no major sense of "personal information" in a collectivistic culture. Although they are individuals, it's all about the benefits of the group that really matters. This definitely caught me off guard, but I let myself be open to the experience and conform to the ways of the culture that was presented before me.
Another
aspect of the Korean culture that I noticed from sitting through this session
was their sense of time. These people really ran on a polychronic time frame,
which really agitated me. Having been born and raised in the United States, I
have always been taught to follow a strict schedule. I grew up with my father
constantly telling me that, “If you’re not early, you’re late.” So when I was
the first one to arrive to the session only 10 minutes before it started, I was
shocked. I didn’t understand why no one was there. And this is why I was so
irritated with people who would come and go from the session as they pleased. I
found it to be very disrespectful to the teacher that people would just get up
and leave while she was in the middle of saying something. But Kim didn’t seem
to mind at all, which I feel is part of the Collectivistic culture that she
brought to the room. Although people were running on their own time, she
happily welcomed them in with open arms. The main characteristic of a
polychronic behavior is that one can do multiple things at once. They don’t
really have a sense of time, they just do whatever they want, when they want,
which is exactly how this session was ran. Even the instructor was very
sporadic with how she presented the material. She had a PowerPoint and specific
videos that she wanted to show, but she never followed a specific guideline.
She was constantly flipping back and forth through her slides, changing her
train of thought every other minute. They also care more about interactions
with people than anything. So I’m sure one reason why most people were not on
time to the meeting was because they had ran into a friend and got caught up
chatting. Another example of this was at the end of the presentation. I wasn’t
sure whether it was done or not because Kim didn’t ever state that the
presentation was over, she just shut down the PowerPoint and started talking
casually with us again, like at the beginning of the session. I was very
confused by this behavior because when I think of Asian cultures, I think of
great respect and strict rules, but I suppose that is very closed-minded of me.
Not everyone is the same, especially after living amongst a different culture
for so long.
One final
aspect that I realized after sitting through this session was how ethnocentric
I actually was. After learning about ethnocentricity, I always thought it was
silly that people would ever think that way. I never used to think, “Oh, yeah.
My culture is the best!” But after immersing myself within a completely
different culture for what may have been the first time, I realized that maybe
I am a little biased towards my own culture. I have always gone to public
schools, which means I am constantly surrounded by other cultures. But never
have I gone out of my way to include myself in a different culture and learn
their ways, besides Spanish, which I am studying. But even with Spanish, I have
never surrounded myself with native speakers with the intentions of learning
how to live amongst their culture. The one point that really stuck out to me
was the moment that I assumed the deep-fried pancake found on the street was
going to be a doughnut. I was so shocked by myself that I would just assume that
one’s culture would be just like my own. Not everyone is as unhealthy as we
are, even though they may be absolutely delicious and my mouth started watering
right when I was the pancake being fried. But that moment really opened my
eyes. Even when I found myself getting irritated with other people in the class
for doing their own thing, I would catch myself thinking, “Gosh, I would never
do that.” So these moments really made me realize that maybe my way isn’t
actually always the “right” way. People are accepted in many different ways,
other than just the way in which I live.
I
definitely prepared myself for a very different event than what I experienced.
Instead of a leisurely walk through type session with booths of information and
different foods to try, I was able to sit down and listen to a Korean native
speak about their typical dishes. Besides learning a great deal about the different
foods that they eat, I also discovered a great deal more about the Korean
culture itself. Immersing one’s self within another culture may be a scary
experience, but a beneficial one at that. Not only can one learn several things
about another culture that they may have never experienced in their life, but
they may also learn a whole lot about their own culture as well.
(Postcard- "Thank You" card that Kim gave everyone for attending)
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