Korean Food Trip

'twas a rainy Saturday, March 24th. An unlikely day for me to go out, and in an unfamiliar place to hang around, too. The place is not very far, but I have little clue about the convenient transportation route going there.

      Well, this doesn’t sound like Janis at all, but I used to belong in a Christian church youth fellowship. Believe it, or not ;)

      I met Kuya Obeth when I was in high school when I joined the youth group. After a few years, Ate Lorna came into our church and become one of our advisers. The two of them always give advice to me, as well as other members of the youth group.

     

      After a while, I got busy with other things, school and friends, hanging around in gigs, and later got a job in Manila. Time came when I no longer fit in the youth group’s nice image and I don’t attend those fellowships anymore. Later, I heard that Kuya Obeth doesn’t go to the same church anymore and has been very busy managing several canteens and other businesses. Ate Lorna stayed and continued guiding the new generation of youth members.

      Thanks to technology and the internet, I found them on facebook. By November of last year, we planned to go out and bond, though the original plan is to gather as many youth fellowship members as possible. That plan took four months to finalize.

      So, here we are, finally. I was uber excited to see them! The place is called M Bul Go Gi, located at the lower level of Terraza Dasma, Robinson’s Place in Dasmariñas, Cavite.

      This is not a review whatsoever of the place and the food. I’m not very good in publicly criticizing things. This is all about the wonderful experience of eating out with my long-lost friends.

 

      Kuya Obeth knows a lot about Korean Food. He has been an English teacher for Korean students for a long time. Most of the time he eats out with his Korean students, and he stays in Dasmariñas, where a lot of Koreans live. Some of them are students while others are businessmen and executives of some manufacturing companies.

      This is my first time to ever eat in a Korean restaurant, though they don’t categorize themselves as one. Said they are just fast food.

      I must agree that the interior fits a fast food outlet, as well as the reasonably priced menu.

       But the service is really nice as well as the taste and quality of the food, unlike most fast food outlets. 

      The first thing that Kuya Obeth ordered is Samgyeopsal. Pork slices grilled on a hot plate with slices of onion and garlic. This is very yummy. It should be eaten in a particular way: on a lettuce leaf, wrap a piece of pork, slice of onion, garlic and chilli pepper, season with dipping sauce of soybean chilli pepper paste and sesame oil. Then pop it all in your mouth. Yum Yum...

      Another exciting dish is a common Korean street food, tukbokki or dukbokki, mainly served as a snack or appetizer. It consists of rice cakes, fish cakes, spicy sauce, some leafy vegetables and sprinkles of sesame seeds. It is very yummy and filling. Something that I look forward to eating again soon.

      Kimbap or gimbap is another popular street food. It is a bit similar to a sushi roll. A bit bigger, though. I was really excited for this one, mainly because I have been fond of Japanese food for a long time. It was nice and I liked it, however I like maki better because of the wasabi dip.

        Using the chopsticks is also a challenge in handling these big sized sushi rolls. The stainless steel sticks are not very easy to use compared to the flat wooden ones. And I’m holding the camera, so forgive me for the uber close-up.

     Bulgogi may be the yummiest of all the food that I have tasted that night. Thinly sliced beef seasoned just right. Sweet, savoury, aromatic, I don’t know. I’m not very good in describing taste specifically. It can be compared to my favourite Jap dish beef tepanyaki. It is sweeter and doesn’t have the sharpness of onion leeks, it is unique in its own way. Due to my excitement, I already have enough kimbap, dukboki and ramyun (which were served before the bulgogi), I have to take the order of bulgogi home and share with Ricky. 

      We have ate what seemed to be too much for three people. We are all full and satisfied.

      After our meal, we were handed some markers so that we can write something on their walls. I actually took the opportunity to plug my recently created blog and wrote the address near one of the dinner tables, hoping that out of curiosity someone might take a look. And as promised, I made a post. The waiter even took our picture so that they can stick it up next to our handwriting, which I doubt they would remember where.

      Kuya Obeth promised that we will eat again next time and in a better restaurant. They told me about a place near De La Salle, said that the ambiance is more Korean, hence more authentic experience. Though I’m looking forward to it, I’m pretty sure that this night will be more memorable. The food is good, but seeing two friends is so much better.

      Oh this is so goddamned wholesome, I’ll be sick. But for the love of friendship I'll be serious this time. I dedicate this post to my dear friends, Lorna and Robert.

SMOKING: I want to, but I just don’t know how.

           I don’t smoke, though in this picture you can see me holding a stick.

          You might as well guess what the scenario is. Well you just have to guess who among my friends has a strict parent (or husband), and fair enough, “Janis looks like the smoking type, so might as well hold this cigarette for me”.

            It is not the first time that happened, but this is the only evidence I got ;).

I have been with a bunch of sweet-looking cigarette smokin’ gals who are ashamed or afraid to let people see them smoking or holding a lit one. So, Punk always comes in to the rescue.

            Only two of these beautiful ladies don’t smoke. And would you believe I am one of the two? With the image that I have, the party gurl, rocker chick, hot babe that I’m projecting, well who would have guessed that I’m nicotine-free.

I’m not trying to preach against smoking.

I’m not encouraging it either. It’s just that, I don’t know how! I really want to learn how to smoke. It looks good and glamorous and cool, oh my God, and it’s a good reason to go out for a few minutes. “tara, yosi break!” And when I’m upset, I just can go out and smoke, take a deep breath, curse a little, smoke, deep breath again, then smoke again... and on and on it goes.

Johnny Depp can make even the most mundane activity super cool and sexy... yes, playing a piano is something, but who else on earth can make smoking such a big deal? Only Johnny! A bunch of guys can strip tease in front of me and I won’t be giving them a damn if Johnny will be there doing nothing but smoke a cigarette.

I’m not sure if Ricky can pull it off just like dear Johnny, or late great Kurt.

Though I don’t have information if Alanis Morissette do smoke, she makes flicking a cigarette sound really cool, as cool as giving a peace sign.

Those are just a few reasons, and I shall say shallow ones, why I’m dying to learn to smoke. The reasons why I SHOULDN’T still outweigh all of the above, and here they are:

Yes, I’m aware of it. And I’m really afraid of that kind of death. In my opinion, the consequences of smoking is worse than what I’m doing, speeding helmet-less in my scooter that doesn’t have a brake. If at any moment I crash, I get to spare myself of that slow and painful death PRINCE (cigarette) warns us about. I’m not gonna post those gross pictures of body parts damaged by smoking, I’m pretty sure we’ve all seen them flooding our facebook news feed to warn smokers of the bad effects.

Another, and I guess one of the biggest factors, is that in my family nobody smokes. My dad and all of my grown-up brothers don’t smoke. Well I just hope that the youngest, Jerome wouldn’t. But if he feels like it, then it’s up to him. I myself wanted to, but was just very “unfortunate” not to learn how.

It would be quite a shame if I’m be the only daughter in our family and I’ll be the first one to smoke.

Dad said he didn’t smoke by choice. It was not an easy choice to make since he grew up in a tobacco farm. The turning point would be a story when he was thirteen years old. Said he wanted to try smoking, just like his grown-up cousins. Grandpa caught him, locked him up in a storage barn and gave him a pack of cigarettes, said that he cannot go out until he finished smoking all of them.

Though I found out that the story was exaggerated back then, what’s actually happened is that when he got caught, Grandpa lectured him about the bad effects of smoking and asked him how can a young boy in a farm would afford to buy such vices. Grandpa actually set himself as an example, a bad example. After the lecture, he gave dad some cigarettes which he refused because of shame. He didn’t light a stick since.

Smoking may not kill me instantly. Abstaining, on the other hand doesn’t assure me of a long life. I have to make a choice that will at least extend my life long enough to see little Siouxsie grow into a beautiful lady.