Kat’s Topical Analyses: Topic no. 1 - The Ajumma

“Ajumma” is the Korean slang term for the tiny old women with black, balding perms and sharp, pushy elbows. They are generally considered to be mean little troopers. Small and hunched in stature, the Ajumma tends to find standing or walking a challenge, yet they are somehow able to block one’s attempts to pass them on the sidewalk. Though the Ajumma is usually slow-moving, she can muster up a sizable amount of energy to sprint toward the closing doors of a subway car, leaving other contenders and passers-by as casualties in their wake. The Ajumma finds the elbow to be a useful weapon when making her way through a crowd, or claiming territory on a congested bus. She thrusts her elbow without mercy, and it lands with precision in the most effective places. Because the Ajumma has most likely paid her debt to society by giving birth to children and increasing the Korean population, she is no longer restricted by societal considerations and/or demands. She takes great pleasure in staring. She will position herself closely to her subject of interest, which tends to be individuals of foreign descent, and she then partakes in a long and overt gawk session. If the subject reacts in any way, such as speaking, laughing, becoming visibly uncomfortable, or attempts to dish it back and stares at the Ajumma, the Ajumma will most likely take offense, and the full-frontal gawk turns into the ever-feared Ajumma Glare of Indignation. This glare is intentional, and usually latches itself onto an exposed collarbone or partially visible tattoo. The Ajumma follows a strict dress code, wearing a knit turtleneck and pants with elastic waist and ankle bands. Their tightly-permed curls stand proudly, impervious to the band of the visor with the exaggerated bill that hides half of the Ajumma’s fallen face. The lower half of her face is covered by a mouth-and-nose mask, made fashionable by the H1N1 epidemic last fall season. Though initially perceived as helpless, the Ajumma is able to sit on her heels for hours at a time, tirelessly preparing copious amounts of kimchi. The Ajumma can hold her liquor. She can drink with her husband, and drag his wasted body home. She can finish a line of Soju shots, outdoing even the freshest foreigner who has come to Korea for round number two of the college life. I find the Ajumma both entertaining and frightening. To me, the Ajumma has been the most fascinating cultural trend I’ve experienced so far in Korea. Please stay tuned for Kat’s Topical Analyses: Topic no. 2 – The Cute Korean Girlfriend (A Phenomena), coming soon.

Field Notes

While at a café this past weekend Kat and I could not keep from being distracted. Across the room from us was a table of four or five nicely dressed Korean women, all of whom must have been in their early thirties. The women, who were obviously very close friends, were laughing and gently drinking their milk-heavy coffee drinks...The whole thing screamed of a weekly coffee date with the “besties.” What made this seemingly normal situation unique enough to grab our attention was the odd behavior of the women. Although quite docile at first, the women’s laughter and actions became louder and more intense over time. At one point the noise was so loud that Kat and I turned around only to see the group fully engaged in a raucous game of hand-slapping. As strange as it was to see responsible looking, grown women behaving in such a way, it wasn’t incredibly shocking. The truth is, since being here in Korea, Kat and I have seen many adult aged people acting in ways that can only be described from a Western perspective as “childish.”

It’s a social phenomenon that seems to present itself frequently and in a variety of situations: an otherwise austere school director attempting to tell a juvenile yet crass joke to his employees, professional women acting more like giddy schoolgirls than mothers of families, successful businessmen stumbling drunk through the streets on a Wednesday afternoon …it doesn’t take long before you seriously start to wonder why such “immature” behavior is not only so prevalent in this culture, but so widely accepted. After wondering about this for a while, the two of us have come up with a couple of logical reasons that might help answer this conundrum.

1) Sometimes strange cultural phenomena emerge from the unusual marriage of the traditional and the modern. Since Korea finds itself square in the middle of this marriage, one could say the issue at hand finds its origins here. As we were told recently, it is very common for Korean men and women to continue living at their parents’ house until they are married. The result of this traditional mentality being enforced in a contemporary setting: a lot of twenty or thirty-something professionals living in their parents’ basements. It only takes a quick look around the staff room at lunch to see this truth reaffirmed. Each person’s lunch is still made and packed by their mother---home-made meals elaborately packed in little Tupperware containers that are of the same color scheme. Seeing as so many adults still live off of their parents, it’s not hard to see why they would behave like children….in many ways, they’re still treated like children.

2) Contemporary Korean society squelches childhood. This might be an understatement. From dawn till way beyond dusk, the average Korean kid’s day is filled to the brim with countless class lessons. Even Saturdays, (a day in the West that has long been equated with sleeping in, watching cartoons, and doing whatever a kid wants to do) are reserved for going to school and studying. After each weekend I ask my students what they did, and like the predictability of clockwork the most common response is: “nothing, I studied and now I’m tired.” I’ve actually heard that children here are more excited for the week than they are the weekend. It makes sense actually…whereas during the week the kids are with their friends at school, on the weekend, the kids are at home, by themselves, studying alone. This society’s push for success and trained excellence leaves little room (or time) for simple fun. For this reason, it is likely that many Koreans take advantage of their older years by embracing the carefree mentality and behavior of which they were once robbed.

Of course, not all Korean adults behave immaturely or childishly. We have met and enjoyed the company of many adult Koreans who act in a way that is normal for Western standards. This blog entry is merely a description of an observation; an observation that has recurred enough times to note its regularity. Regardless of what the cause is behind this socio-cultural phenomenon, it is exactly this type of puzzlement that makes living in a foreign culture the exciting, humorous, frustrating, and often enlightening experience that it is.

Another week in the land of the morning calm

Gleaning from our minimal observations so far, Korea seems to be deserving of this otherwise clichéd nickname. In the early morning, not a whole lot is happening. On our first morning here, Kat and I decided to wander down to the local coffee shop and start the day right with a strong cup of joe. Much to our dismay, the lights were turned off and the door was locked shut. The only English on the door’s sign read “open at 10:30.” For Westerners accustomed to the early morning, half-conscious mob of professionals desperately scouring the street-sides for their first cup of coffee, this seemingly nonexistent need for a legal stimulant seemed strange, and at the time, disappointing. Don’t get me wrong, Koreans love their coffee and their trendy coffee shops, but their drinking of it tends to happen much later in the day. In the same vein, the nights are longer here. Even though the workday’s hours are about the same as back home, their nights are much longer. It’s a quizzical riddle concerning the health of the modern Korean working man: 8-10 hour work days and bars that remain open until 6 a.m. And apparently, no need for an early morning coffee. Something doesn’t add up.

But I digress. Last weekend was full of activity that demands explanation. On Friday our school threw a Halloween party for the youngest students. Planning it was quite a bit of fun, especially since the Korean teachers seemed more excited about the idea than some of the students. The kids came all dressed up in whatever costume they or their parents thought was customary for Halloween. Seeing as the festivity is almost unknown here, many of the costumes consisted of items that could be hastily purchased at the local grocery store. Kat and I went as Harry Potter and Lisa Simpson- two familiar pop icons in this country. The celebration was going smoothly until the school’s director decided to have all of the students line up outside in order to experience our coveted “trick or treating” activity. At first it seemed like a decent idea; get the kids out of the building, show them how to properly partake in such an important aspect of the cultural event, waste some time, ect., ect. Such perceptions changed when we learned what was really going to happen.

It turns out that our school’s financial leaders had been keeping their collective eye on a newly opened, upscale apartment building complex in the neighborhood. Naturally, the school wanted to tap into this market as soon as possible- little did we know that it would happen during our much anticipated Halloween bash. In the end, the party turned into a marketing campaign for our private school. All of us foreign teachers were made to wear sashes that displayed the company’s name as we walked the long line of students through the neighborhood and towards the apartment complex. When we reached the gate to the complex, the security guards refused to let us in. As a result, our little caravan of decorated marketing pawns was kept out in the cold for half an hour, waiting for the unknown. Once inside, the situation didn’t get much better. While some of the children were allowed to escape the cold and get inside the warm apartment buildings, other students were left outside in the cold. What’s worse is that the children who did make it inside were given candy. The children who were left outside were eventually met by their warm, cheerful, and candy carrying classmates. Obviously, fairness and equality do not seem to be valued here as much as in North America. Actually, we’ve felt this sentiment on a number of occasions already, and it seems to emanate from our perception of Korean culture as being harsher and less sensitive than that of ours…whether this is a qualitative truth is beyond us. We understand that when experiencing the initial stages of cultural immersion, one has the tendency to start comparing the new culture with his or her own.

Besides the Halloween party going up in flames, the rest of the weekend was very enjoyable. Kat and I hit up a part of the city we hadn’t experienced before with a few friends Friday night, and on Saturday we were shown around the fish market area in Nampo-dong. My friend Mark from high school has lived in Busan for over two years now and he and his Korean girlfriend Yeojin have not only been incredibly hospitable, but more than willing to show us the sights and sounds of the city. After giving us a thorough tour of Busan’s renowned fish market, Mark and Yeojin took us out for perhaps the strangest meal I’ve ever eaten: live octopus.

As we entered the modest restaurant I could tell that it had not been frequented by many foreigners. Some of the Koreans looked at us as if we had arrived there by mistake. Some simply chuckled. We sat cross legged underneath a table that was raised about half a foot from the wooden floor. A live octopus was brought to our table and snipped into pieces by a woman using rudimentary scissors- the kind a kid might use to cut construction paper. The tentacles writhed in shock, dislocated from their fellow limbs. We indulged. If you’re inexperienced in the field of octopus eating, be sure to chomp the living ink out of it, because if you don’t, the tentacles will suction themselves to your throat as you swallow. It’s a bit disconcerting eating something that still has the capacity to wiggle its way out of your mouth. Regardless, we ate the creature successfully, along with the eel that had been mixed with it.

After the octopus and eel, we set off into the dark alleyways of the fish market area, in search of yet another unique Korean delicacy. Our reasoning: if the creatures of the sea failed to appease our hunger, maybe a respected land mammal could. The restaurant (if you want to call it that) for this next meal resembled a mechanic’s garage, and it had the smoky air of a tent containing a burning barbeque. After sitting on one of the many metal benches lining the perimeter of the room, we watched a woman chop up a long, rope-like strand of meat, and place the cylindrical pieces into a skillet in front of us. The dish: fried pig intestine and heart. To be honest, I wasn’t a big fan of the intestine. It was like eating a fried chunk of pig fat, and in actuality, that’s largely what it is. The heart had more taste to it. Overall, the night was a tasty, albeit interesting culinary experience.

More to come.