Cop-py

The first day I had lunch at my school, I was handed a tray with five round indents, two chopsticks, and a spoon. The indents held: rice, soup, kimchi, and two side dishes. I thought it strange that there were no drinks served, and wondered if I should have brought my own. None of the Koreans had drinks with them. It made eating difficult – not only is Korean food rather spicy, but I am also not used to eating without drinking.

After two weeks of dreading lunchtime (not simply because of the no-drink policy), I decided that I should bring my lunch to work. I still had never seen anyone with a drink at lunch yet, and neither had Paul. I pulled out my peanut butter sandwich and fruit, and my coworker looked at my lunch, frowning. “You don’t have a drink,” she said.

“But, you never have a drink,” I answered.

“Koreans always drink their soup,” was the reply. As I puzzled over this idea, my coworker spoke again.

“In Korea, we always peel the apples.”

I decided not to worry about the apples. If they thought I was eating dirty or inedible things, I wasn’t going to care. They eat dried squid, cow kneecaps, and dog.

A few days later, I decided to have some Korean coffee at work. Korean coffee is instant coffee. It comes in individual, marker-sized pouches; each pouch contains a mixture of coffee, cream, and sugar. Usually, Korean coffee is made in Dixie cups; they shake the dry mixture in, then pour boiling water to the 3-quarter mark – it makes drinking coffee feel like doing shots. On this particular day, however, I wanted a warm mug of coffee, so I used two packets and filled my glass mug. My coworkers began commenting immediately, pointing at my mug and talking. I could see some of their eyes widen. Drinking a full cup of coffee is apparently as strange as eating an unpeeled apple.