1001 Ways to Eat Rice

Last night Hyo Jin cooked us dinner. It was a marvelous production; she spent about an hour and a half cooking it in the 90-degree heat wafting through our windows. Some sort of chicken-curry-stew-noodle dish, it had a thick brown sauce and was surprisingly spicy. So spicy, in fact, that I began to sweat. It wasn't so bad at first, but then suddenly I realized that while my shirt sticking to my back and nobody else even had a sheen on their face. My nose was runny, my hair frazzled by the humidity - I must have looked like a fool.

Tonight she cooked dinner again. Hyo Jin has become my new Evan. When she moves out I'm probably going to revert to relying on my One-A-Days and the few "healthy" things I pick up. Food shopping in Korea scares me. I've been so spoiled by suburban American Wonder-marts...but the grocery stores here are even smaller than what I'd been used to in Poland. Of course the fact that all the names, brands, cooking instructions and nutritional information are nonsense to my eyes doesn't help make it any less intimidating. But beyond that, this country is brimming with foods, flavors and ways of preparing things that I had never even heard of. Dried fish is everywhere - dried anchovies are especially popular at bars (instead of peanuts). Of course there is the kimchi. Cucumber kimchi, lettuce kimchi, beansprout kimchi, kimchi kimchi. And I never knew how many things you can do with rice! It's incredible! And I don't even know the half of it because most of the things that have been identified to me as rice I wouldn't have ever guessed to be...rice. The standard birthday cake at C&C is rice cake - this delicious concoction of rice pounded into a fluffy, bready consistency with a tiny bit of sugar and some food coloring. The versatility blows my mind.

The kids delight in teaching me about the Korean food we are served at lunch everyday. They crowd around me and point at things, blurting their Korean names at me and waiting, puppy-eyed, for me to recite them back. Then they announce which things are yummy and which things are "don't like!" Lunchtime is my favorite part of the day.

Today I walked into the classroom with my full tray and there was instant silence. Uh-oh....what did they do now? Then they tried to tell me what was up - but I still can't understand most of the things they try to tell me. All I could hear was Ella's name being said over and over. Then another kid walked in and everybody laughed. They were betting on who would come in next! And it looked like Ella was the crowd favorite. Gradually the seats filled up and still no Ella. The class never gave up hope that maybe - just maybe - Ella would be the next one in. A couple chants started up and dissolved into piles of giggles upon disappointment. Then finally, when there were only two empty seats left, Ella came. She appeared in the doorway with a smile and a big "hello!" and the class erupted into cheers. The poor girl had no idea what was going on but as soon as the shock dissipated she grinned even harder. It was ADORABLE.

Almost as adorable - but not quite - was the scene I walked in on about 5 minutes after the morning classes left on their bus. The halls were relatively empty. The afternoon kids hadn't arrived yet so only the smattering of morning kids who stick around for further classes. The piano (or one of the keyboards) is always being played during breaks so I've gotten used to that but I was surprised that "Heart and Soul" was being played since the kids are either way better than that or practicing scales. So I went down the hall to take a look and was treated to quite a sight: My boss (whom you just have to think of a a giant teddy bear) was playing on the keyboard surrounded by little kids. And he was laughing and they were laughing and then he crossed his hands to play the fancy way and it just warmed my heart. Like a scene from a movie.

And I'm still smiling.