Recipe #9- Instant....

Hello everyone!

How are y'all (you all) spending your school break? (for those who are having one)

How are you guys doing lately? Amazing? Good!^^ 

Living in a fast-paced country like South Korea requires a great deal of efficiency, precision on top of performing with outstanding results. It's just like making cup noodles. Pour some hot water, wait for 3 minutes and you're good to go! There is nothing more outstanding than an efficient and customer-friendly delivery service! Congratulations South Korea. You guys nailed it! The delivery service cover a lot of areas naming from food (pizza, chicken, rice, noodles, etc) to dry cleaning. 

WHENEVER (24/7) and WHEREVER  you are, place an order, and it will be right in front of you in no time. It sounds too good to be true right? Trust us, that's the reality.^^ The ads, flyers and stickers especially for food delivery (complete menus) are literally EVERYWHERE! There are mostly found in front of your doorstep and on your door. YEP. On your door. Malaysia, we gotta step up our delivery game, okay! 

Street-Invasion

Continuation....

Two words: Street Food
#KoreandMalaysia #whodoesn'tlikeit #love #delicious #tummyexplosion 

Street food are a type of sweet and savory comfort food that are accessible everywhere, day and night, you name it. Regardless of the differences in menu (between Korean street food and Malaysian street food), they serve one ultimate purpose of being CHEAP, DELICIOUS AND CONVENIENT. 

Let's use less words and more visuals, shall we?^^(p/s:for those who are suffering from late night hunger and never in a million years intend to break your diet regime, this is strictly not our fault) (sources: Sha and google images) 

Let's explore the streets of Malaysia and "makan-makan" now! (Makan=eat) Yes, more fooooooooooddddd...... *this is just a snippet of some famous Malaysian street food* (sources: google images)

What is a great food without company and finally, this is our wefie with Min Gyu^^ (source: Min Gyu's phone**)

Recipe #8- Food planet

Hello beautiful ladies and gentlemen!

How are you guys feeling today? 
We hope everyone is having a daily dose of amazing days. 

Calling for the passengers of MaSeoulPalette^^ Welcome aboard. Let's fly to FOOD PLANET. 

Have you guys watched Korean dramas and ever wondered why they have so many things on the table? These smaller portions of food or side dishes are called 반찬 (reads as BANCHAN). According to our trusted source ㅋㅋㅋ (Jo Kang Woo /조강우), the basic food on the table would be rice, kimchi and soup. There are different varieties of banchan and they make the whole table more colorful and appetizing. Oh! People exchange banchan too on certain occasions. Korean parents usually pack and send banchan to their kids. On the contrary, we don't have banchan in Malaysia since we basically have one or two main dishes at the dinner table(depending on the family).  

Pretty awesome right? 

On top of that, since the coffee culture is blooming in Korea, a lot of coffee shops offer a variety of premium coffees and mouth-watering desserts. Prepare to salivate... (evil laugh) These places are hot spots for meeting, studying and especially a low-key paradise for young couples. There are many songs about coffee shops too. ^^

Recipe #7- All about Communi-CAKE-tion

Hello fellow humans!

Today we are going to devour communi-CAKE-tion (read the pun. Okay it is not funny. Sorry. ^^)

Comprehending the basic understanding of Korea being a high-context cultured country, they always stress on being POLITE (verbal and non-verbal). 

1) Bowing. This is the basic way of greeting and showing respect to a person. Actually there are a few types of bowing depending on the situations. We don't really bow in Malaysia. Whenever we meet people, we shake hands or just smile or simply wave (usually with the opposite gender)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJLrEzpzpYA

2) From the greetings [bowing] to entering the house [don't wear shoes inside the house] to the table etiquette until the drinking [alcohol] culture, being polite should be ON POINT. This starts from setting up the table to never sticking your chopsticks in the rice to having the elderly eat first before you. Unlike Korea, we don't really have strict table etiquette in Malaysia except that some/a lot of us are not allowed to talk/discuss when when are eating/at the dinner table. A lot of parents will say " jangan sembang masa tengah makan - don't talk/chitchat when you are eating " to their kids.

 Oh! They turn their head or back away when drinking with someone elderly/of a higher rank/senior as a sign of respect. [Probably you all have seen it a lot in dramas right?] This is quite interesting as we (Muslims) are prohibited from drinking alcohol, we don't have any drinking culture. 

3) Speaking politely. This can be reflected in their language that possesses different speech levels unlike English and Bahasa Melayu. They have certain honorific endings according to rankings that should be observed and used when speaking to people. We know that a lot of you learn Korean through dramas and whatnot, HOWEVER, it is IMPORTANT to distinguish between the formal speech and informal speech especially when you are talking to them especially on the first meeting.  

4) Hearts! This is a common gestures done by the celebrities and a lot of people are doing this too. Girls.... Prepare to hyperventilate.....

For more information, check out the video down below. 

More rice cakes for you^^

Continuation....

2. 추석 (Chu-seok) [Reads as Chuseok)

Chuseok on the other hand is the Harvest Moon Festival or widely known as Korean Thanksgiving Day.The other name for Chuseok is Hangawi (한가위) depicting "the ides of August or autumn". This festival is celebrated on the 15th day of the eighth lunar calendar [August 15], being said the day of which the full harvest moon will make the grand entrance. 

What do they do on Chuseok?
Remember "Charye" from the previous post? 
Good! 

However, there is a slight difference between the Seollal's Charye and Chuseok's Charye stating that the major representative of food during Seollal is tteokguk (rice cake soup) whereas the major representative of food during Chuseok are freshly harvested rice, alcohol and songpyeon [the colorful scrumptious-looking rice cakes. 

Hanbok***

The traditional way of celebrating these two huge festivals requires the people to wear Hanbok (traditional clothing). Nonetheless, the younger generation of Koreans do not wear Hanbok on these two occasions anymore. I (Izzy) remember having my Korean friends telling me not owning a single pair because of the price tag [expensive]. I think all of my friends are not dressed in Hanbok during Seollal and Chuseok. 

Contrasting to the scenario in Malaysia, a lot of us (Malays who are celebrating Eid Fitri) put on some serious thoughts in choosing our Baju Kurung (female traditional clothing) and Baju Melayu (male traditional clothing). A lot of us get more than a pair of Baju Kurung (girls......), having color-synchronized attire with the rest of the family members and.....there will always be this one group of people who even reach to the extent of spending thousands of Ringgit just for this occasion. Nowadays, there are also people who make Baju Kurung or Baju Melayu for their cats. Oh yes! We receive generous amount of money and love from our parents too! <3

Recipe #6- Extra-happy days!

Greetings Earthlings! 
What is MaSeoulPalette if we don't talk about festive seasons and double shots of extra-happy days? Traditional holidays bring people together and the main ingredients of these days are (traditional customs and practices, family, traditional clothing and last but not least [this is the highlight of the whole event] FOOD!) There are two exceptionally special days in Korea, namely Seollal and Chuseok and without further delay, let's venture and explore these holidays, shall we?!

1. 설날 (Seol-nal) [Reads as Seollal] 

Believe it or not, we Malaysians celebrate this holiday too but with an entirely different name. Falling as the first day according to lunar calendar, this day is called "Lunar New Year's Day" or Seollal and it lasts for three days. In Malaysia, this festival is often known as Chinese New Year (because of the majority of Chinese celebrating it).   

This celebration calls for a lot of preparations and memorial services [Charye] are performed to express their gratitude to their ancestors and pray for success. On top of that, the common gifts for Seollal are department store gift cards and cash. It's quite interesting to see the broad use of gift cards because it's not that popular in Malaysia. 
The morning starts with ancestral rite before proceeding with family gathering and feast on the ritual food. 

The two must-have dishes on the table are Tteokguk (rice cake soup) and Songpyeon (half moon shaped rice cakes filled with sweetened beans, red beans or chestnuts inside). The traditional symbolic meaning to eating Tteokguk during Seollal signifies adding a year to one's age. 

Tteokguk

These scrumptious looking rice cakes are called Songpyeon

In Malaysia, the common understanding and thrill about Chinese New Year is definitely the "angpau". The younger generations in Korea will pay respect to their elders [saebae] before presenting them with gifts. The elders will then offer their blessings and ........ give them 'saebetdon' in return (New Year's money). 

The third layer of...

Continuation.....

Ladies and gentlemen, with a humble heart sprinkled with glitters of enthusiasm, we present you *drum rolls*

The third layer of recipe #5 entitled STEREOTYPES, now focusing on Min Gyu's perspectives and experiences. This bitter layer is made up of a basic question or rather a blunt statement of "Koreans are not good in English?" (play around with the tone and you can see why it can be considered as both question and statement)

Min Gyu's honest and firm answer within a split second to the question is an obvious NO!
Koreans are well internationalized in arrays of aspects. Min Gyu has always encountered this familiar response of "Wow, you are good in English for a Korean" during his stay and travelling days abroad of which can be expressed as one of the biggest stereotypes towards the Koreans. The crucial point of the existing limitation in using English in Korea should never be missed nonetheless. 

Furthermore, Min Gyu also with much concern voiced out his opinions revolving the education system of his country of which the people are said to be endeavoring for endless competition to survive and this goal can only be projected through education. The acquisition of English started since elementary school and the people in the society are expected to possess high level of English proficiency. HOWEVER......

The system of emphasizing only on grammar, listening and reading skills, leaving out the writing and speaking skills as the social environment pushes them to study English just to get a clean/decent roll of certificate or SAT. This scenario eliminates the need to work on the speaking skills. Moreover, the popular belief of Korean's strong accent when speaking English (ex. Ban Ki Moon, the General Secretary of United Nations) DOES NOT IN ANY LIVING UNIVERSE indicate that they are not good in English. 

Korean can understand whatever you are saying better than the others due to the rigid and intensive education system. The moral of the story is: DO NOT UNDERESTIMATE their ability in English. The pauses that they take from time to time are the time allocated to calculate or double checking the grammar in their head before speaking it out. 

Keyword: RESPECT. DO NOT OVERGENERALIZE. DO NOT DISCRIMINATE. LEARN. LIVE. LOVE.