Korea: Frozen 불고기피자 bulgogi pizza

Sometimes, especially if you choose to pursue the path of the starving artist (or, ahem, self-fulfilled professional artist) for the majority of your twenties, you may find yourself craving for something filling and cheesy, yet still reasonably priced (or, to be frank, cheap). Grocery stores and cooking at home are generally going to be more generous to your wallet than dining out, though it's hard to really say which is better when it comes to Korea... if you're worried about your health, dining at home may actually be the better option as restaurants are typically quite resistant to making changes to any of their menu selections and cook for flavor, not health, typically. If you're used to the American attitude of "have it your way", where you can customize your burger or coffee to the point of absurdity, you're going to have a hard time. Fact. Korean chefs don't give two shits if you think you can't digest gluten and have a sensitivity- they're going to look at you like the fool you are for having gone to a pizza joint in the first place. Now, look- I know sometimes these things find a way of happening, where the one person in the entire group who happens to be a vegan gets dragged along to the steakhouse for dinner and gets stuck eating a sad baked potato or green salad with oil and vinegar because it's the only thing they could find lacking in animal parts... these things just tend to happen from time to time, especially in the case of "unusual" or "extreme" dietary decisions. But if you find yourself in this sort of position while in South Korea, or even Japan (where people are known to be overly accommodating at times), trust that the chef in the kitchen making your food will give absolutely zero craps about your dietary choices and needs. He's been making the same dish the same way for the last who-knows-how-long, and he's not changing it for anyone, definitely not you (or me). Also, I would really recommend against trying to adhere to a stringent vegan or vegetarian diet in South Korea, anyway, simply due to how prevalent the use of fish broth and other animal-based seasonings is and how rare veganism (or even good old ovo-Lacto vegetarianism) is outside of temples. 

And let's be fair, here. I didn't have to resort to pizza to fill that gaping hole in my insides. I could have gone to the local kongnamul gukbap restaurant and eaten a boiling hot bowl of soybean sprout and rice soup fresh from the kitchen, replete with side dishes and a fresh egg, for less than $5 US. But sometimes, ya girl needs some good old fashioned greasy American-Korean fusion food, and this frozen bulgogi pizza totally fit that bill. It definitely wasn't the best thing I've ever eaten, nor the cheapest, but it served its purpose. 

Until next time~

🍕

XOXO,

NAU

Korea: Lotte World lines and fusion food

Briefly on this blog in the past have I discussed my time working at Lotte World, in South Korea's bustling capital city of Seoul. It was, for better or worse, the furthest location from my living arrangements and required the longest commute to get to and from, clocking in at roughly three hours of transit time a day and four separate train rides. Heaven forbid I oversleep, or time out my transfers wrong- though, to be fair, the morning commute is pretty well covered by the city's subway system with frequent running trains helping ferry people to their various jobs in all the different corners of the city on time. The transportation system of, say, the city of Las Vegas, could certainly take a few pointers from how well organized and run the system in this massive catacomb of subterranean tunnels is. While I doubt any country could effectively try to compete with how unbelievably well-choreographed the Japanese train system is, Seoul's is pretty damn fantastic. Only a handful of times in six months was I ever late, and that was due mostly to user error on my part like not understanding the menus which, presumably, would warn against the trains that were stopping and going offline at the next station, or missing my train outright. Like I said, these things were squarely my fault for failing to properly utilize the system or grasping the language, so I can't fault the city or the system there. 

Once I finally did make my way to Lotte world, there was no assurance of escape from the crowds clustered together in the trains- if anything, there was a pretty solid chance it'd be even more crowded! Lotte World is a popular theme park, after all, and towards the end of my time working inside of the facility there were some new and exciting attractions introduced, which led to a huge upswing in traffic. As someone who's decidedly not super-keen on big crowds, this wasn't hugely favorable, though in reality it mainly translated to a very long line of people actively ignoring me. Fun stuff. Since I wasn't being paid hourly, and I wasn't making a huge amount of money with most of the visitors more interested in checking out the new attractions, I ended up going downstairs and grabbing a meal at a Korean-Mexican fusion restaurant inside the Jamsil station complex. It wasn't bad! 

More photos below~