When you are walking around by yourself in a non-English-speaking country, signs with recognizable words tend to jump out at you, like fireworks. Everything else is gibberish, so even simple phrases like “Please here” (sic) and “Don’t worry, price” (wtf) deserve to be looked at and pondered. You don’t know how long it’ll be till you see another sign you can decipher, so you savor these moments.
This is largely how I arrived, today, at The Flying Pan, an Italian ristorante in the middle of downtown Daejeon. I walked past over a dozen more interesting-looking restaurants on the way here, but none of them appeared to have menus with pictures in them. The Flying Pan, meanwhile, had Actual English Words next to the Korean names for all their dishes. As they say in Manila, “San ka pa.”
My favorite travel writer, Bill Bryson, once wrote about how visiting non-English-speaking countries would reduce him to an almost childlike sense of awe. Nothing made sense, everything seemed new and strange, and even the simplest of actions needed to be explained to you. It was like being 5 years old again. I loved how utterly astute this observation was. I can’t remember the last time it seemed appropriate to be proud of having taken public transportation by myself, but here I was. Proud. Now watch me ask for directions from this lady in the convenience store. She motions to go right then down two blocks. See that? A regular Christopher Columbus, that’s me.
In Korea, the custom at restaurants is similar to that of the Japanese. Upon returning with your order, the waiter will leave the bill turned face-down in a corner of your table. Subsequent orders will include subsequent bills, each one turned face-down. When you’re ready to leave, you take the pieces of paper with you to the entrance, where the cash register is, and pay there. I like this system a lot, as it avoids potential disagreements by providing you with status updates. Also, it allows me to indulge myself in that favorite touristy pastime, i.e., computing how much more they are charging you in this country for something you could also get back home. There is also zero tipping here, which is fortunate as I have difficulty gauging the relative value of things. I’ve been in Daejeon for a week now, and I still haven’t gotten used to the 0.04 multiplier. (My Brain Age is like, 75.)
I leave The Flying Pan and resume my exploration of the downtown area. It’s about 6 degrees today, and my gloves are nice and toasty in the cabinet back at home. I duck under the second English sign I see (the first read “DVD”), and find myself in a beautifully modern cafe called Flower: Coffee & Wine. The place is organized into booths with high-backed love-seats, heavy wood tables and dainty glass chandeliers. The Asian art deco is lavender and mauve; the music is 24/7 Korean pop ballads.
Casually ignoring the name of the place, I order a beer. A Cass, this time, one of the two major Korean beer brands. I had tasted the competition, Hite, two nights before and was largely unimpressed. When my order arrives, I notice with some amusement that while Hite’s tagline (“Cool & Fresh”) sounds like it was cribbed from a bottle of mouthwash, Cass’s strap (“Sound of Vitality”) is straight off of an energy drink. Both brand concepts seem to be studiously avoiding the obvious notion that beer is alcohol and alcohol gets you drunk, in their respective branding. (See Red Horse’s “Ito Ang Tama,” as the primary case.)
On my way out of Coffee & Wine, I receive a minor fright when I am informed that I owe the restaurant “two million, four thousand won.” Considering that the currency’s largest denomination is only 50,000 (which they introduced just this February), this was truly a significant amount of money. My feeble Brain-Age math told me that, converted, this was a little under a hundred thousand pesos, which is quite possibly the most anyone has ever paid for a beer and chips in the history of the world. Then I look at the register’s display, and rather curtly inform the cashier that he means “twenty-four thousand.” I thrust the cash into his sweaty palms and walk towards the exit as quickly as I can.
This happens to me two more times over the next 48 hours. Apparently, Koreans have trouble differentiating “tens of thousands” from “millions,” and randomly use the latter when they mean the former. It’s a mildly disconcerting trait, but understandable considering that their number system is significantly less elaborate than ours. (Of course, by “ours” I mean the Western counting system.)
Another interesting Korean trait: . North-East Asians in general have the lowest level of apocrine sweat glands amongst all races (the glands that produce body odor), and Koreans in particular have the lowest of the low. Nearly half of them don’t possess them at all, which represents, in this writer’s humble opinion, the next stage in human evolution. (The Japanese have, rather predictably, taken this notion to the extreme—it is possible to be exempted from military service purely due to having body odor, in the same way others would be exempt if they were handicapped in some fashion.)
As I stand in line for a cab, I keep my nose alert for bodily scents and fragrances. Happily, I smell only the occasional dash of cologne.