Tigers and Cranes

I’d have to say I had an interesting experience riding in a Korean subway.

Now Seoul subway system is a marvelous engineering, taking you and your lazy non-walking ass anywhere you want to go in Seoul… most likely to go drinking or eating. But, did something change on these subways or is it me? I recall Seoul subway being unbearable exercise in putting up with rude-ity, with loud and obnoxious riders practically screaming on their cellphones or doofuses listening to music real loud-like.

I haven’t seen much of that this time.

In fact, I found myself riding the subway much more often than I used to, sometimes preferring it over taxis when there’s a lot of traffic on the surface. It also helps that the ticket is a buck.

But what is it with the transfers? For example, for me to travel from the nearest station to my hotel to anywhere intersting, I have to transfer once, maybe twice. I don’t really mind that, but sometimes I’d have to walk for ten minutes underground and countless flights of stairs to change lines. Most Koreans don’t seem to mind, and I’m just probably being a non-Seoulite whiner, but DAMN.

Anyway, the interesting story on the train:

The car that I was trundling along in was pretty much fully occupied, and I was staring blankly at the space in front of me as I contemplated the long “transfer walk” that lay ahead of me. Then, I see this tall white dude in a suit walking by my seat, which is not at all unusual in Seoul, as the city is teeming with foreigners learning to make kimchi or what have you.

He looks around, and spots me, and hands me a flyer, and begins to read from a type of script to everyone on the train in fairly fluent Korean. This is odd, because he handed the flyer to no one BUT ME. In the entire car.

What the?

So I read the flyer, and realize it’s a “Get married in Unification Church” Run by no other than the Moonies.

This got me to thinking:

He gave me the flyer to me and only me because:

1: It looked like I’m just the sort of person who’d love the idea of mass marriage wth 20,000 other couples, or,
2: I looked just like the type of dude who’d join the Unification Church run by Rev. Moon.

Either way, I was flattered.

Here, I even took pictures of the flyer.

Busan is a rather pretty city. I hadn’t noticed this before, since the last time I was here, I just blew through the city on my way to Seoul, but this time, I did the proper tourist thing, and spent some more time in this port city.

Arriving in the train station, it was a quick taxi ride to “Jagalchi” Fish market, and by the sheer scale and the number of stalls and shops that sell various assortment of fresh seafood, you’d think the entire Busanite’s diet consists of fish, crabs, and shellfish. Actually, that might not be stretching the truth much, since it seemed like most people who were shopping in this sprawling market were mostly locals. Afterall, what is a tourist going to do with five pounds of slimy snake-looking fish?

The outside market is teeming with vendors, but once you enter the rather nice indoor fish market, prepare to be blown away. I’ve never seen anything like it, with rows upon rows of stalls each selling some sort of seafood, and the place is densely packed with fish tanks, holding tanks, and just plain seawater gushing everywhere, especially the floor. Don’t even think about entering this place wearing sandals. Fortunately, I was wearing a sturdy pair of non-slip shoes, and even that was a dicey proposition, as the entire first floor might as well be as slick as a water theme park.

Second floor is where patrons go to eat the abovementioned seafood. Once again, the whole of second floor is packed densely with restaurant stalls, each proclaiming to have fresher seafood than the one next to it. I must have counted at least forty such restaurants.

With this many number of places all selling the same food, how does one choose? I suggest the reader not dilly-dally trying to pick a place to eat. If you stroll through this area, every vendor will try to grab yo and amke you sit at their table. At first, I felt bad declining each and everyone, but after a while, getting desperately hungry, one must simply choose, and my criteria was which restaurant had the best view.

I chose one with a nice large (electrically operated)window facing the beautiful harbor.

Sitting on the wooden floor(no chairs here… it’s all Korean style). It was decided that the meal would be (LARGE) sashimi set. While hirame(flounder, my favorite) was one of the most delicious sashimi I’ve ever had, the sheer amount and variety of “service” dishes made my head swim. There were live octopus(I finally ate some. I tried to re-enact the sushi bar scene from the movie “Old Boy”. ), Hoya(sea squirt), some kind of marinaded fish, conch, shrimp, abalones, some othe kind of crunchy fish, and dozen other plates i can’t remember now.

and to top it all off, really excellent “meh-oon-tang”, a type of spicy fish soup.

If you are a seafood lover, I can hardly recommend a better restuarant(s) than the one you will find in “Jagalchi” Fish Maket. Make sure you bring your appetite.

Sorry for the delay in postings lately. I’ve been traveling in Korea, and have had preciouls little time to write.

I took a day trip from Seoul to the seaside city of Busan couple of days ago. Normally, it would be pushing it to travel to Busan for a day and return on the evening, but with the KTX, the Korean Bullet train, it’s feasible.

Having skipped lunch to rush to the Seoul Station, I missed breakfast and lunch. But I figured I would just grab something quick and eat on the train. Inside Seoul Station are many restaurants, serving anything from traditional korean meals to quick burger joints. Cultural philistine that I am, I went for the quick burger joint, the Lotteria. Now, Lotteria in Japan and and the ones in Korea differ, in that I’ve never seen “Bulgogi burger” in Japan. Bulgogi, of course is Korean BBQ.

Another surprise item at the Lotteria: Squid Burger. Oh, yeah, I just HAD to try this one.

The Bulgogi burger taste quite good, and I would highly recommend it. Squid burger, on the other hand, may not be to everyone’s liking, but it’s actually quite good too. It’s kind of a fried onion ring tasting thing, and didn’t really taste like squid, although the texture was certainly there.

Something about traveling makes me a greedy pig, and I also stopped by at the train station’s doshirak(bento) store. To those of you expecting Japanese style bento will be profoundly disappointed, as korean bento technology leaves something to be desired. One of the joys of riding around in a train in Japan is its endless variety of bento, but here, it seems that we’re pretty much left with “Tuna Nude”, whatever hell that means. basically, it’s just rolls with bits of tuna in it, and it wasn’t really that great. on the other hand, they do give you a little plastic sealed cup of water, and it only costs like $3.50, so I suppose one can hardly complain.

The KTX ride this time around to Busan was a lot more pleasant. The riders of the train were quiet, non-obnoxious, and for the most part, no different than the Shinkansen riders of Japan. I still wished that the seats rotated, so that I wasn’t riding backward, as KTX’s trains have fixed seats.

Rifling through the KTX literature, it seems that the KTX-II, to be unveiled in a few years will address this problem and will have seats that rotate to face the direction of the train’s travel. Also, while the current KTX is a joint venture between the French Alstom and indigenous Korean tech, KTX-II will be all Korean domestic, and I’d have to say, better looking as well.

The trip took about three hours, and this is because the KTX shares the common rails of slower non-bullet trains. It seems that the original plan was to have exclusive KTX rails, but what with Asian financial crisis of few years back have forced the Korean Rail to cut costs. So on some sections, the train moves terrifically fast(over 300kmh), but in most other sections of the railway, crawls along at other train’s speed. KoRail is also addressing this issue, and will have all KTX rail soon, shaving the travel time between Seoul and Busan to about two hours or less.

Lexus, and to lesser extent Infiniti and Acura are a well known success story in the automotive world. They seemed to have come out of nowhere, establishing a Japanese luxury brand while the traditional German manufacturers were guffawing at the audacity and apparent foolishness of these Japanese luxury upstarts.

“Hey, Ingo, did you hear? Toyota ist making ein luxury kar!”
“HAR har har! Ja, Dis ist ridiculous! We have been making ze Ultimate Driving machine for fifty years! Ve haf nothink to fear from ze Japanese.”

Well, no one is laughing now, as some of the best luxury cars are coming from Japan, and as an evidence of their success, Lexus is now being sold in Japan(previously the marque did not exist in Japan).

Not all Japanese car manufacturers have been successful at establishing an upmarket brand in America; Mazda had a go with “Amanti” division, but it was stillborn, presumably, because financials didn’t make sense.

So should we be laughing when Hyundai says it’s going to start selling a luxury sedan in America? The vehicle, for now, is called “Genesis”, and is the first rear wheel driven, V-8 sedan from a Korean car maker. V-8 is significant, since most snobbish luxury car buyers don’t take a sedan seriously unless the hood has 8 cylinders stuffed in it. Witness the incredibly slow selling Acura RL, with its V-6 being left in the dust by Lexus LS series with its big honkin’ V-8. Never mind that RL has an ass-kicking 290 horse power V-6, nor the super SH handling thingie, as well as my personal sybaritic favorite, motorized window shades and sound system that rattles my fillings. Damn fine car, but for most people, no V-8, no cigar.

So Hyundai takes a bold gamble, following in the footsteps of brands like Toyota and Nissan by introducing its V-8 sedan with 4.6L engine, 6 speed auto tranny, achieving 0-60mph under six seconds. Of course, the interior will have all the leather trimmings and neat electronic gizmos.

So that’s that. But also from Korea comes this nifty little car, purported to be the country’s first “Supercar”, called Proto Spirra. Claimed performance is 0-100kmh in 4.4 seconds (I suppose that might mean 0-60 in 4.1 sec?) with a top speed of 305 km/h. With a mid-mounted 4.6L V-8, as well as the scissor door, this is the type of car I’d like to see coming out of Korea more often.

It rains in Japan. Who’d have thought? When one lives in Southern California, AKA the desert next to the ocean, it’s one item people leave home without, and generally it’s safe to assume that a person isn’t going to get soaked from precipitation. And, if it rains, so what? Just hop in your car and drive away.

Not so in Japan and Korea, where it rains whenever it(clouds, I guess) feels like. In fact, the rainy season in those countries during summer is one long depressing season of constant wetness. What if a convenience store wasn’t around when it begins to rain? (I know, it’s a remote possibility, as there’s a Lawson’s or Seven Eleven or something, it seems, on every corner.)

Well, you can make use of this umbrella vending machine, spotted in Roppongi, and the picture which I stole shamelessly from Flickr.

So you see, in Japan, umbrellas are essential piece of gear. Even I had an umbrella, one of those cheap 500 yen clear plastic ones that you can buy all over Japanese convenience stores. But not used to carrying one around, I’d invariably leave them in the public bathroom, stores, and work, and yakitori places.

It’s easy to do, really. Many urinals have a hook next to it just to hang umbrellas. Like this:

Kind of sad, really, but there was one time when I stopped by at a dry cleaner to drop off some clothes, the nice old lady looked at me as if I was slightly daft.
“Where’s your umbrella?”
“Ah… I don’t have one.” (I didn’t want to tell her that I have a memory of a fruitfly, forgetting and losing my umbrellas everywhere. Plus, I’m sure I didn’t know the Japanese word for “fruitfly”.)

She clicked her tongue, looked at me with pitying eyes, and gave me one from her collection of plastic umbrellas. Funny thing, though. This was one umbrella I never lost.

One other thing I like about umbrellas in Japan… Entrance to many a shops and restaurants you can see this thingie.

You just slide in your wet, dripping umbrella before entering indoors in this device, and presto! Your umbrella has sort of a condom to keep from dripping rainwater onto the floor. No more the need to lick your umbrella dry before you enter that coffeshop, boss. I mean, you all do that, right?

As a bonus, here is a pictures of a “light up” umbrella, with the… uh, rod that glows. Why? for safety, dummy. Plus, your inner Jedi screams “Cool! I must have one!”

Ah, what the hell, here’s another picture of a Japanese umbrella. Remember, at Tigers and Cranes, we love umbrellas!

My correspondent in Jolla-Do, Korea(the Tigers and Crane media empire is vast) has sent back some great pictures from the sea-side town of Masan[마산].

Masan is a port city on the southern tip of Korea, and as such, seafood, and from the looks of it, “Mung-Gae” or “Hoya” or “Sea Squirt” are plentiful.

It is interesting to note that in 1274, Koreans (Kaya? or is it Bekje?) staged an invasion of Japan from this very city, along with a bunch of Mongolians. We know how that all turned out.

Masan, written in Hanja and Kanji as “馬山市” (MaSanShi) is fairly close to the huge city of Busan to the east, and according to our good friend Wiki, is the originating city for “spicy monk fish soup”, which was feautured on Iron Chef. Oh, really? I have to find that episode. I tell you, it’s a good thing they make a soup out of the monkfish, cuz that’s one ugly looking mofo.

Also, it seems that Himeji City (With the greatest feudal era Japanese castle still in existence) in Hyogo Prefecture is its sister city.

Okay, enough Jeopardy trivia. On to some photos!

Here we have a photo of “Masan Fish Market”. Oh, man, you just know that big fish on the sign means good eats are lurking within.

Clams and bivalves of all size and shapes. And for that authentic flavor, the flooded ground. This is heaven for those who seek fresh seafood.

More clams and… what are those long-ish tied up thingies? Sea cigars? They might be some type of mussels. And on the top right corner, what appears to be disgusting looking sea-sausage… or sea worms. Cooool.

Ah, sea squirt. Don’t they look delicioux?

Some fresh conch. These things have indescribable taste. Possibly my favorite drinking snack.

Octopus, mung-gae, sea cucumber, sea worm(?) and others sashimi.

“Beef from the field” as some used to call it in Korea, soy beans have been a very important part of Korean and Japanese diet. There are many ways to prepare it, simplest probably being edamame (pronounced eh-da-ma-meh, not i-da-mami) in which soy beans, with the whole shell is boiled with some salt and served, usually, as appetizers or for beer snack.

I personally like to pour out a bit of soy sauce and dip em in and eat them with chopsticks, because that’s the kind of refined dude I am, but most people just seem to squeeze the beans into their mouth, barbarian style.

Speaking of soy sauce, it’s also made with soy beans. Kikkoman is the prevalent brand most people are familiar with. But maybe not everyone is familiar with the brand’s spokesperson and mascot, “Kikko-Man”. No, really.

The link below will take you to a little flash movie about exploits of “Kikko-Man”, who comes from the “Planet Soy” to do battle with evil “Foreign Sauces” like worcestershire and mayo. I guarantee you, once you hear the refrain of the song “Show Me, Show You(which is a clever word play, “shoyu” is, of course Japanese for “soy sauce”), you won’t be able to get the tune out of your head.

Kikko Man Movie

Where was I?

Another wonderful way to enjoy soy beans is natto, with which many westerners recoil in horror. Perhaps it’s the fonky smell, which kind of reminds me of my well ripened socks in summer, or perhaps it’s that gooey, stringy spider-web like snot that these fermented beans produce. Whatever, those that do not partake in these mystical beans are seriously missing out. These things are great on top of a steaming bowl of rice, or stirred in a cubed fresh raw tuna or squid, or fried, which makes a great beer snack.

On a blog-magazine called “The Sneeze”, there is a segment in which the owner of the website tries to eat many (to his thinking) disgusting things. He tries eating natto, and here’s a snippet of what he had to say.

“This particular batch was made by a company in Japan called Shirakiku. I haven’t been able to determine if Shirakiku is a food manufacturer, or just a store that sells gag gifts and practical jokes. It might be both.

Not unlike Michael Jackson, these harmless soybeans had undergone some kind of hideous transformation. They were now a freakish version of their former selves. (Which, coincidentally, should also be kept away from your children.)

The most disturbing aspect of this stuff is it seems to get “activated” when you stir it. What I mean by this is, (and I may actually weep, but…) the slimy coating on the beans develops into stringy, stretchy, marshmallow-like strands that will forever haunt my dreams.”

Check out the full article Here. (It’s Steve, Don’t Eat It! Vol. 6)

Let’s not forget its versatility as soup base, in the form of miso soup in Japan, and den jang soup in Korea.

For a while, few months back in Japan, one could barely find any natto on the storeshelves, as there was a craze that took place where natto was seen as a diet food. It turns out that it’s not really, but who cares? It’s one of the most versatile and nutritious food out there, not to mention very tasty.

On my previous post, I talked a little bit about my misadventure in Inchon Airport. I would like to return to talking a bit more about the city. Now as a fairly large city on the coast next to the largest city in South Korea, Seoul, Inchon sees a fair bit of Seoulites visiting on the weekends, eager to escape the crowd and dizzying hustle and bustle of the city. Because of its proximity, less than 45 minutes from Seoul by car, some Seoul workers have decided to move out to Inchon to better be able to afford the ubiquitous high rise apartments.

For those that do make it out to Inchon for a day trip from the capital, the main draw probably is the sea. I wouldn’t exactly call it a picturesque beach city, more like giant mud-flat beach front. Nevertheless, where there is ocean, there is seafood, and Inchon has them in great giant spades.

A friend of mine took me to the sea food market as a farewell lunch type thing, and they would see me off, as Inchon Airport is rather conveniently located in the same city. And I, being an eater of anything that swims, was pretty happy. The drive out to Inchon was quite pleasant. One either has an SUV or a sedan in Korea (quite distinct from Japan, where SUV has all the cachet of a farm tractor), and my friend drove a Hyundai Santa Fe. Except, unlike Santa Fes sold in America, this one was a noisy, clattery diesel. Didn’t smell like one, though.

Anyway, like many Korean drivers, he drove like a maniac, and upon finding a parking space on the street near a fish market, we headed off to see just what kind fresh sea food would be available for sale. All along the sidewalk were huge nets that were spread apart, drying in the sun, apparently ready to be mended by the fishermen. The smell of the sea, salty and tangy, made me hungry like a proverbial mofo.

The market itself is a shock to the senses. All around is the din of fishmongers calling out their wares, and many implored me to take a gander at their fine, live crabs, as well, that particular seafood smell was omnipresent, and the sheer sight of all things swimming and squirming and swimming was enough to make anyone apoplectic.

The crabs that were on sale did look mighty fine, though, and quite a bargain too. But what would i do with a live crab three hours before my flight leaves Korea? Would they confiscate live crabs at Japanese customs? I had no idea. Regardless, my buddy does buy three large crabs, and asks the rubber booted fishmonger’s wife to hold it for us.

Another really cool thing i saw were small baby octopi, the kind where you don’t even bother cooking and just dip em into some sauce and eat them live, squirming and choking you from inside out. I didn’t try this, being a wuss that I am. But I hear they go really well with some soju.

There are absolutely astoundg number and variety of shell fish, some as big as my fists, and some typically smaller manila-clam looking bivalves. Oysters were plenty, and so were all sorts of different variety of multi-hued mussels. I’m getting hungry just typing this.

So we return to retrieve our crabs, and head off to a VERY casual restaurant where all the chairs are plastic, and interior decoration consisted of fading beer posters on bare walls. Each table was round, with a pit in the middle, and in this pit the proprietor of the place placed a metal pail of VERY hot natural wood charcoal. The effect, in this early summer day, was unbearble heat, but one figures it’s all part of some kind of exotic culinary experience.

First, they bring out a pair of gloves for each diner. Not rubber or nice ones with flowers on them or anything, just coarse, cotton workman’s glove, presumably to shield one’s hand from the intense heat and to guard against cuts. Then they bring out a arge metal bucket, in which to toss in discarded shell fish, and the piece de resistance, the bivalves themselves in another large pail. And with that and some tongs, we got to work on placing these mussles, oysters, and clams on the fiery grill in front of us.

If you ever have a chance to do these kinds of grilling, take my advice and wear some safety goggles. When the outside of these shellfish reach a critical temperature, without any warning they will go *CRACK* and pieces of calcium-laden shell bits will go flying in supersonic speeds, usually towards your face. After a while, I felt like I was facing a firing squad, and learned to not look directly at the cooking shellfish, but rather obliquely, and with a hard squint, lest i be henceforth be known as the “one-eyed sea shell shucker”.

Oh, right. The taste. It was incredible, these fire grilled shellfish. The fire essentially concentrates all the liquor these shellfish have inside, making them taste severely awesome. In fact, giant clams are usually pretty tough and tasteless, but using this method, they had the most excellent sea-weedy flavor and just the right chewiness.

We gorged ourselves like it was going out of style, and just when i thought we’d finished, the owner saunters over and on the very same grill lays out a pot and with remainder of shell fish, makes some excellent hot(temperature and spiciness) seafood stew.

But what about the crabs?

My friend tosses these on the grill too, and I am amzed that they can shove more seafood into their maw. I was done, man, and gave up my claim on the crab to these ravenous wolves. I’m pretty sure they were extremely delicious as well…