New Year’s Celebration – Korean style

Wow. It has been an experience. New Year’s Eve we taught until 9pm. As soon as classes were over, the Korean staff was waiting to take us across town to the New Year’s Eve party being hosted by the school’s president, Mark Kim. As the only female still at the school (Chanta had one of her classes cancelled, so had left to freshen up) I made an executive decision. I told the staff they would have to wait until I went home and changed, that I was not ringing in the new year in my Kate School uniform. Before anyone could protest, I sprinted out the door, to my apartment, a mere 5 minutes away. Once home I donned everything I had that had sparkles. Black pantyhose with rhinestone seams. A lavendar skirt with multitudes of sequins. A black fuzzy sweater. A hairclip with a ridiculous amount of rhinestones. Then Chanta appeared with a tube of sparkly gel. We rubbed it on our bare arms, in our hair, on our cheeks. And in the process downed a couple of glasses of wine from a bottle she had picked up from the 7-11 around the corner. Quality.

When we arrived to the school, the men were sitting talking, not looking very festive. We bounced in, sparkles galore, and announced that we could depart. We took a couple of cars across town. Chanta, Eun-Ju (the accountant at the school) and I were in the back seat. Mr. Pyung was driving. He told us that he had gotten snacks for us. There were a couple of cans of Pringles and some cookies in the back seat. They love us! As we were driving across town, Eun-Ju pointed out a nightclub, Athens. She said it was really fun. Then sheepishly smiled. We asked why she was laughing. She said it was a place to go for “booking.” Booking? What was that? She laughed and said she could not explain it. Which made us even more curious. We asked Mr. Pyung what booking was. He just laughed. Eun-Ju hit us and shook her head no, that we shouldn’t ask him. So we asked her again. She proceeded to explain that booking was meeting someone. We asked, like a blind date? She laughed. Yes, sort of. We asked if it was a place to meet people that you had talked to on the phone, but never met before, or to meet someone in person that you had talked to on the internet? She shook her head no. Okay, so what is this booking? I asked her if she had ever booked? She laughed and said, once, when she was 20. Chanta and I looked at each other and started laughing. Hooking up! Club Athens is the Balboa of Daegu!

After about 40 minutes we arrived to our destination. Party. No, that’s not just what we were going to do, that was the name of the bar. When we arrived, the teachers and staff of the other Kate School were already there. Hugs all around, great to see you, how have you been? Endless supply of Korean beer and soju. Oh, the evil soju. A Korean drink. Maybe like vodka? Just incredibly strong. You do shots of it and wake up with a horrible headache. But it’s the national drink here.

Then – the highlight of the evening. Karaoke! Yes! I finally realized my dream of being a back up singer in a rock and roll band. Okay, maybe not in a band, but I was in demand. I think not so much for my singing ability (or lack thereof) but for my moves. Oh, yeah. My sequins were sparklin’. I put the Supremes to shame. Everyone wanted me to be their back up singer. I do-wapped like there was no tomorrow. Surfin’ USA, House of the Rising Sun, Macarena, Fools Fall In Love, you name it, I was singing it. At midnight we didn’t have a ball to watch drop in Times Square, so Brian (another teacher) improvised and dropped a round Korean pastry as we finished the countdown.

We stumbled home very late (early?) after an evening of incredible comaraderie. I slept in til about noon. As soon as I got up, Chanta knocked on my door. She lives right below me and heard my footsteps. We had the ultimate college dorm room day today. Clad in pajama bottoms and t-shirts, hair pulled back in ponytails, we finished off the bottle of wine we started last night, played cribbage for hours and listened to our favorite CDs. We also discovered a surprise treat. Laying on the floor. Yes, you read correctly. The heating system here is in the floors. And floors are kept incredibly clean everywhere. You don’t wear your shoes in restaurants, in homes, anywhere – they’re left at the door. For some reason I was on the floor today, maybe getting something out from under the bed, and I realized how incredibly warm the floor felt. So we laid there. I can’t even begin to explain how comforting it is.

After being inside all day, we decided to head out to the saunas. We had seen a sign advertising them close to the school. We were expecting a combination between a health club and/or spa. Not. We walked in, took off our shoes, got lockers and disrobed. We were looking around for the towels, or robes, or something, but none were to be found. So we entered the sauna room. Which, I think there was a sauna somewhere, but basically, it was just a room of huge baths. And showers everywhere. All along the wall, and at small stations throughout the room. A huge bath that was hotter that any water I’ve ever felt, a warm bath like a hottub, a freeezing cold bath, a steam room, a salt room, rooms to lie on the hot wooden floors. We tried each of the baths, each of the rooms. I think that since private homes don’t have tubs people come to the saunas as sort of a social occasion, but also to soak, and scrub. Women chatted animatedly as they scrubbed each other’s backs, washed each other’s hair. Mothers were there with their children, friends arrived together as well. We stayed until our fingers and toes resembled shriveled raisins, then got dressed and left.

We were famished. As we walked down the street, we smelled a delicious aroma. We decided to check it out. Another cook your own food in the middle of the table place. We sat down and the waitress brought us salad and condiments. After a while, we noticed that people were going to a corner in the restaurant and coming back with platefulls of raw meat. Chanta sent me over; I returned with a variety of meat, garlic and onions. We cooked the meat (burning quite a few pieces as we did), rolled it in lettuce, added roasted garlic and dubbed it the Korean taco. We didn’t eat a lot though, something about just eating meat is really filling. Chanta’s comment of the evening was, “There’s got to be something wrong with just eating animal fat for dinner.” True, so true. After a while, exhaustion set in. We called the waitress and asked, “Ol mayo?” She told us 10,000 won. I stood up, took out a bill, and tried to leave. She pushed me back down to the floor. She pointed to a few pieces of meat we had not eaten and began talking loudly in Korean. She kept motioning for us to eat it. We pantomimed that our tummies were full. At this point everyone in the restaurant was staring at us. She left in a huff; Chanta and I looked at each other, trying to figure out what to do. Was she telling us we had to clear our plate? We we committing a cultural faux pas? She returned with a beer, sat down beside me on the floor, and proceeded to pour two glasses. “Service, service.” Nooooooo – no more alcohol. Even if it’s free. We just wanted to leave. She poured the beer and motioned for us to drink. So we did. We noticed that on her apron the word “run” was embroidered with lots of flowers around it. We decided that the next time she went to the kitchen that was what we were going to do – run. We had our chance — we quickly got up, scurried to the door and tried to get our shoes on as quickly as possible. Not quick enough. She saw us and across the restaurant yelled, “Annong kay-seyo” (good-bye). We smiled, bowed, returned the salutation and left. After further pondering, we think she was giving us the beer because the restaurant was all you can eat and we had not eaten very much. So she was giving us a free beer to make sure we got our money’s worth. But when you don’t understand any of the words coming at you at an incomprehensible speed, there’s often quite a bit lost in the translation.