K-town Eats#2: Gahm Mi Oak

The first time I got to go back home from college was during Thanksgiving break. The school bus (Williams Transport is probably one of the biggest programs I have to thank CC for) dropped me off at Penn Station around 4, which left me enough time to grab a late lunch/an early dinner at K-town before heading home on the LIRR. I had no hesitation about which of the delectable restaurants on the Korea Way that I would pick.

I chose Gahm Mi Oak.

The reason for this choice is simple: for three months, I went from having great Korean food every day in Busan to having dining hall food. Dining hall food was not yet quite gross for me, but it did mean that by the time November rolled around, I magically started craving for foods I’ve never thought I’d crave for. Bean sprouts, jeotgal (pickled roe), cucumbers, my grandma’s weird smelling leafy thing… but most of all, I was surprised that my body was literally screaming for some kimchi as I looked eagerly out of the bus window. And Gahm Mi Oak has one of the most consistently tasteful kimchi all around K-town.

Kimchi is really just a method of cooking/pickling, so I supposed I should specify what I mean by that: the most generic form of kimchi is the spicy napa cabbage that’s slightly fermented. I really enjoy the sour smelly fermented part of kimchi and can’t get enough of the sourness at home because my grandpa doesn’t like the sourness. There are all different forms of kimchi with all different veggies, but this is the form that pops up in people’s minds first.

Gahm Mi Oak’s specialty is the Seolleongtang. (I recognize that I fail at descriptions, so I’ll just post a link to wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seolleongtang) Seolleongtang is basically milky looking ox bone/meat broth with rice and some noodles. It takes a long time to really brew the heck out of these bones and make it that yellowish-white color, and Gahm Mi Oak doesn’t necessarily have the best version. Although they clear the oil off well, there’s a little less feeling of home-cooked broth than I’d like and their rice and noodles pretty much suck because everything is pre-cooked in mass quantities. They do have a decent amount of meat, which is always a plus.

But my parents spoiled me in terms of the broth itself since they (and my grandparents) do a lot of gomtang out in the backyard, and their sweat and hard work really show through in the delicious product. I much prefer to have Gahm Mi Oak’s Soondae platters, but don’t indulge in it too often because it’s expensive.

But I stepped off that bus and headed to Gahm Mi Oak, simply because their kimchi is great. (Also, it was a cold day and I knew some seolleongtang would keep me warm on the train.) They give it to you in this small pot which I guess is supposed to mimic the huge pots that kimchi is traditionally stored and buried in. They don’t give you just a plate of it, they give you a mountainous load of napa cabbage and radish kimchi. (Seolleongtang is actually supposed to be eaten with the radish kind… but I’m still not quite used to radishes and besides, their cabbage kimchi is awesome so I never bothered.) I scizzored up some of the cabbage kimchi and started stuffing before the seolleongtang even came. As a result, I had two heaps of kimchi all by myself that day.

There’s something in the fermentation process that works in Gahm Mi Oak kimchi that doesn’t in my grandma’s kimchi: there’s an extra crunch, an extra bite, and an extra tang to the kimchi. It’s also a little bit more saucy(?) than most kimchi I’m used to eating. The pinkish-orangey-red water that runs off of the kimchi is more like a syrup here. Delicious spicy drippy syrup specked with hot pepper flakes…. The kimchi that’s generally served because it’s a side and it’s just so ubiquitous to Korean meals becomes one of the main attractions in this store. To further prove their kimchi’s worth, I believe Gahm Mi Oak sells their kimchi (or at least, they used to…) which is akin to a fried chicken joint that sells bucketfuls of their cole slaw.

One of the first things you hear about as you approach Korean foods (or at least, it should be…) is kimchi. We’re trying to globalize other Korean food, but really, kimchi is the face of Korea. (Deliciously pickled and fermented face…) There’s hundreds of ways to make kimchi but the red-sauce-on-cabbage is probably the most known type and therefore the most challenging to be famous for. My personal taste runs towards Gahm Mi Oak’s crunchy, sour, and not-too-salty kimchi, so this is the place I would be recommending to anyone who wanted to learn more about kimchi.

And as it is with (probably) all places in K-town, they will refill your pot of kimchi without questions, even if you’re a short teenage girl eating by herself  next to a large suitcase.

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If you insisted on a seolleongtang experience but didn’t know how to properly eat it, I guess I should probably explain how here.

There will be a pot of chopped scallions on the table and a pot of salt. Although you’ll need more salt than you think, start with just a spoonful. Stir with your metal spoon, taste, and keep adding like half a spoonful at a time until you reach about the point where you think it could be saltier, but it’s alright. Get a spoonful (or three for me) of the scallions and you’ll find that these bits of green onion cuts through a lot of the oily/heaviness of the deep ox bone broth. If you really wanna go hardcore Korean, there’s a reason why they give you all that radish kimchi. Cut chunks of radish, coat in its own sauce, and place it in your soup, mixing the kimchi sauce with your soup. (Or add the entire plate’s kimchi sauce if you really enjoy kimchi) This adds spice and briny-saltiness to your soup.

Robyn Lee on Serious Eats NY has way better descriptions (and pictures!) than I do. I’m just really obsessed with their kimchi.

http://newyork.seriouseats.com/2009/06/seolleongtang-ox-bone-broth-from-gahm-mi-oak-koreatown-nyc.html

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Also, Gahm Mi Oak has multiple locations…

Food

August 4, 2010

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Sweet Zucchini Pancake

I went down to the Farmer’s Market again yesterday and bought some bread and cherry tomatoes. One of the stands had really tiny zucchinis that seemed too cute to be true… and also, just enough for me to experiment a little bit. So I bought a green mini zucchini and a yellow mini zucchini.

I grated the zucchini and put some salt on it to make the veggie bits crunchy. Then some flour and egg and mixing action with a bit of salt and sugar to make the batter for zucchini jeon. Unfortunately, the recipe I had looked up online told me that the batter should look more doughy than watery, although I remembered my mom making it a bit more watery. I should’ve trusted my instincts because the jeon ended up being a bit bread-like and more of a pancake with a hint of zucchini. I’m also going to buy more zucchini next time and put lots of it in.

With some of the leftover egg, I made Spam jeon. My first batch didn’t end up looking like the Spam jeon I used to have at home, so I floured the second round before dunking it in the egg. Still, it didn’t quite look like spam from home, although it did look more crispy and delicious. I’m gonna have to figure out the secrets behind this…

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I hopped on Twitter out of boredom and found that some people back home use it while people at school generally don’t. Anyways, K-celeb twitters are hot nowadays, so I started following some. I only followed celebrities that I really really liked… and the list was homme-heavy. I… I guess I *am* a bbasoonie after all…

Food

August 1, 2010

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K-Town Eats#1: BCD Tofu

People often ask why I don’t cook Korean food at school and the reasons are quite simple. Many dishes take too much of time that I can use to do other things, can’t stand alone as a dish, are designed to be shared by multiple people, and the ingredients are quite hard to come by. While I can whip up a few of the banchans (side dishes) easily enough, I’m also not skilled in the art of soup/stew making which greatly decreases amount of variety I can show.

If my friend still wanted to see what Korean cuisine was all about, though, I would take them to three places: my home, Flushing, and K-town. Some nice fresh hwe (raw fish sliced) that my grandpa buys straight from Freeport and cuts nicely into bite size pieces, fresh vegetable banchan from my garden, and my mom’s impeccable savory steamed egg that I cannot mimic for the life of me. Great variety of food you can taste as you walk from the Municiple Parking Lot and all the way down Northern Boulevard, everything from some nice duck barbeque with fried kimchi on the stone slab to naengmyun (cold noodles) with delicious galbi (marinated short ribs) grilled over smoky wood.  But why abandon places like these and do a series on K-town eats?

My home and Flushing are not as easily accessible to my friends without my help. K-town, however, is situated right near Penn Station, meaning that all kinds of people can easily go to these restaurants and order. It becomes the gateway to Korean food for many people around the area, meaning that putting good food on this street determines how people perceive the value of Korean culture and food. Japanese cuisine, with its mild flavors and similar appeals to the western audience, has spread albeit with much alterations. Korean food is inherently harder to appeal to non-Korean audiences as the preparation is quite time-consuming, it is based on a spiciness and savor that doesn’t fit the western models for these tastes, and uses many parts of food that the Americans tend to throw out.

The food in K-town generally still stick to the traditional taste for the Korean-American community but struggle to enhance rather than merely dump flavors that are unfamiliar to non-Korean audience. Anyone who knows my fondness for the conveniently located “Korea Way” probably knows that, because I am a student and a cheap-ass, my to-go place is Woorijip. However, I think the beginning and the end of this series are the most important and we should begin with a sit-down restaurant.

BCD Tofu is a chain restaurant which started in L.A., spread not only to this coast and Japan but has the distinction of being one of the few, if not only, Korean-American chains to establish a branch back in the motherland. Yes, the chain that started in L.A. is so popular, it has a location in Korea. They specialize in soft tofu stew and serve individual pre-cooked portions of bbq dishes like galbi (short ribs marinated) beef bulgogi (thinly sliced prime cuts marinated) pork bulgogi (thinly sliced pork marinated in spicy sauce) bibimbap (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bibimbap  <–Korean foods are hard to describe…) and other specialties. But really, I would not bother with the other dishes because you’ll be more than full from the banchan (side dishes) and the hearty stew you eat with rice. A disclaimer– do not touch that egg that your server maybe has placed on the table. It is not boiled egg. You’ll use it later.

BCD provides a hearty spread of banchan right after you order, usually marked by the ubiquitous kimchi, the representative food of Korean culture. They’ll serve you the kind that’s only slightly fermented and spiced, perhaps another kind that’s less spicy and in some clear soup, but still fermented. The fermenting process is not as weird as it sounds and it produces what is basically a Korean napa cabbage pickle. The banchan spread here also includes ojinguh-jeotgal (spicy pickled squid) and a whole fried fish as well as other typical vegetable side dishes (my favorite bean sprouts generally make an entrance). They give you these dishes basically for free. Sometimes I get full from the banchan before the stew even comes out. Banchans are shared among the table and refilled at request.

Their soft tofu stew requires some choices on your part. First, you pick your level of spiciness (mild, regular, and spicy). This is for foreigners who have difficulty eating spicy food. Being a Korean, I am a total sucker for spicy. However, BCD regular spice level is actually spicy enough for my stew, although I’ve seen people order theirs “spicy” aka paralysis by the fourth spoon. Korean spicy is not the same as hotsauce spicy, so I would really give a lot of consideration before ordering your stew “spicy”. The regular is the right level for most.

Then, you decide what kind of ingredients you want in the stew. They have beef, pork, kimchi, seafood, soy bean paste, vegetable, and curry. As your instincts will (hopefully) tell you, do not order curry. I’ve never seen it and I’m glad for that. I recommend seafood. Why? Because I always recommend seafood. They put in lots of small clams, oysters, and shrimps. But the kimchi (which comes with bits of beef or pork) isn’t bad either and there’s the assorted for those who want seafood AND beef. For vegetarians, there’s vegetarian soft tofu stew made with special vegetarian broth (it’s usually beef-based broth).

The BCD Tofu makes their soft tofu in the house and I love their silky soft tofu. Tofu is really rich in protein and tastes so savory but has bad reputation in America. It’s because American tofu sucks and I don’t know how some of these restaurants make tofu so hard and tasteless. (Real vegetarians know how to buy the Japanese kind and cook it right) Soft tofu is creamy and delicious, so no worries.

They serve the soft tofu stew in a special stone pot that you’ll witness in many Korean restaurants. It comes boiling hot. This is where the egg comes in. Take your egg and crack it right into the soup and close the lid to wait for the soup to cool down. The egg cooks in the leftover heat and provide an even more savory taste to the soup. (It won’t cook all the way but leave a creamy yolk you can stir into the soup).

As you wait for your soup to cool, you’ll notice that your bap (rice) comes cooked in a special stoneware as well. This is not typical, as Korean restaurants are more likely to serve your rice in a tiny stainless steel bowl. However, the BCD rice is really such a gem, with its ratio of rice varieties and the perfect steamage, as well as the burnt bit that will settle against the hot stone surface as you let the rice sit also. These burnt bits are called “nooroongji” and are kind of like “soccarat” in paellas. Nooroongji is a byproduct that ends up being popular than the actual rice. There’s a special use for it at the end of the meal, so the restaurant gives you an empty stainless bowl to dump the rest of your rice into. I hollow out the middle of the stone pot of rice and press the rice onto the sides deliberately to make more of nooroongji.

You can eat the stew and the rice separately or mix rice into the soup. I like to keep the two separated and start out with the soft tofu. It’s hot… I take a big chunk of tofu with my spoon, put it on top of my rice, shmoosh it down to cool it quickly, and eat it with a bit of rice, take a spoon of the soup afterwards. Usually, I would eat the seafood first but the soft tofu at BCD is too good to be treated like a second citizen. I start adding the seafood and vegetables on the top of my rice bowl after a few chunks of the tofu and enjoy every bite. I usually become stuff before I reach the end of my stew.

However, I leave some room and add water to my stone pot with nooroongji in it (just enough to cover the nooroongji!). After you let the rice bloat a bit, scrape the nooroongji off the side with your spoon and it’s like a rice soup. It’s so grainy and makes a nice clean finish to your meal. (This part of the meal involves a taste that is not named in English — DO NOT SAY UMAMI umami is a Japanese thing and a little bit different than the taste I want to describe) but anyways, it’s a palate cleanser. Many a Koreans become fond of the dry and wet version of nooroongji and I think of the soup/gruel version of it whenever I feel sick (among other things…). I forgot what they give you for “dessert” but it’s probably orange slices, maybe melon if you’re lucky.

Why pick BCD? While there are other (better?) places where you can get good soft tofu stew on K-town, this place is universally liked because of its principles. Their motto includes “clean hands” and this is how you can tell they take serving non-Koreans seriously. Just kidding, but really, their principles are solidly Korean. Their preparation of soft tofu in house every day shows the dedication to getting the freshest, best ingredients. The controlled customization shows desire to cater to the guests’ needs without totally ditching the traditional parts of the dish. The bountiful banchan shows desire to provide variety and satisfy every stomach on the table (some of the best spread of banchan at a Korean restaurant that I’ve seen yet). The stoneware shows refusal to skip steps and the nooroongji serves as a contrast to perceptions that Korean food is always spicy and busy.

Next up is a post of a restaurant with the best kimchi I’ve ever had.

Food

July 30, 2010

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CPK-inspired Mock Kung-Pao Chicken Pasta

The first time I went to California Pizza Kitchen, I ordered their famous BBQ chicken pizza while my aunt and grandma went for the Kung-Pao Spaghetti. At the end of her plate, my grandma fished out something strange from her sauce.

“It’s a roach”, she said calmly in Korean.

For you and I, this may have been screamed at a hair-frying decibel. However, my Korean grandma was a lot more composed in front of bugs in her food.

My aunt hailed down a waiter and reported what we’ve found and the manager quickly arrived at our table, apologizing profusely. I had recently moved to the States and therefore did not know that a single report to the health department could bring down entire chains. All of our already-eaten dishes were on the house and they offered us dessert on top of our free lunch, as well as another plate of the Kung Pao Spaghetti. We took home the spaghetti and a BBQ chicken pizza and I remember this incident as one of the very few times where I have eaten dessert at a restaurant.

Any normal human being might be too creeped out to go to CPK again. However, my grandma and I are old-fashioned Korean women and therefore we continue to eat their tasty pizzas and pastas. The Kung Pao is a favorite of our family. This is one of the very few memories I share fondly with my grandma (most of them are of her being a selfish a**)

Anyhow, I bought a box of spaghetti from home and realized I had an awful lot of pasta and now a whole lot of means to cook it, so I whipped up a Mock Kung-Pao Chicken Pasta in the honor of this memory. The actual recipe for this is online and involves things like dry sherry, cornstarch and chicken stock, none of which I have touched in my life let alone possess in my dinky cooking arsenal over the summer. Frankly, I haven’t even eaten a plate of this dish in a long time, so I went by a faint memory of taste and mostly instinct. Heck, you know by now that I don’t measure.

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Mock Kung Pao Pasta

Choose either linguine (like me!) or spaghetti and start cooking the pasta. Check on it as you make the sauce and cook it just to the point where it is somewhere between al dente and full-blown floppy. Fish out of water, drizzle with olive oil to prevent sticking.

Start the sauce by mixing two large spoonfuls of pasta water together with two large spoonfuls of soy sauce (keep soy sauce at bay). Add some sugar into the sauce and heat gently. Taste and season according to your desires using the soy sauce and sugar (or chopped onions instead if you have onions). I would keep it a little bit on the saltier side than the sweet. Add a small spoonful of chopped/minced garlic and bring to shimmer. Immediately add chili paste (I only had gochujang, the Korean chili paste… Viet/Chinese pepper paste might be better because gochujang adds a lot of sweetness) Let the simmering thicken the sauce a bit and add shredded chicken, peanuts and any veggies you may want in there. (Scallions, onions, carrots, red pepper slices… just keep in mind that many of the veggies add to the sweetness and therefore plan accordingly during the early stages!)

Add pasta to the pan and coat all of the noodles with the deliciously spicy-sweet sauce. Once the pasta and the sauce seem sufficiently happy living together, place on plate and dig in.

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For my first attempt with the lack of ingredients, it was pretty dang good. I didn’t know how well I mimicked the flavor of the Kung Pao Spaghetti, but it tasted muy bueno besides being a little bit sweet. Linguine was the right pasta choice because I had to plate the pasta, pack away all of the stuff I used, clean up the kitchen area, and wash my pot, pan, and fork before taking the first bite. And then I moved up 6 floors to my room because I’m not comfortable eating alone in that basement. The linguine pasta= a little less room to bloat. It tasted pretty darn good even cold, so I would say it was a good attempt at least. Because I was busy eating, I also forgot to take any pictures of this concoction.

Ah, well, you can’t have everything.

Food

July 27, 2010

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Scary Story I

Some people heard this from me before… I don’t believe in “ghosts”, but sometimes I feel the presence of what I believe is a bit of a person’s spirit left in some special place. I’ve never seen a ghost but I’ve felt something touch me lightly and hold my hand, especially in old buildings. (Never graveyards though– if you were dead and had to stay a bit on earth, why would you pick a lonely graveyard?) It’s very brief and friendly most of the times, but once in a while it feels like pricks and pinches and I just keep quiet while trying to move away as quickly as possible.

Like I said, it’s hardly ever anything more than a touch or a pinch. I lived in a neighborhood built in the 60’s (relatively new) and didn’t even experience much of this, although there were couple of times when I sensed a friendly presence. When I moved to college, I saw that I was living in a place that looked like it was built pretty recently, so I was happy about not encountering anything here.

More than halfway through the year, I suddenly felt uncomfortable around the kitchen area of my hall. I figured that most of it was due to some association with negative events that involved the kitchen, like clogging in the sink or weird stench from the fridge. It got a little bit more strange when I started imagining a girl kneeling down on the top shelf of the kitchen, right above the sink. Every time I would turn the corner to use the sink or go through the common room, I would be startled over and over again. I really felt like I had seen glimpses of a young woman with short black hair covering her face, kneeling right above our sink…

Putting it off as silly, I moved around some of the trays and dishes on the top, figuring that my mind was playing some tricks on me. After all, no one else expressed anything of the sort and the dark tray against the wall must have reminded me of someone’s hair. After rearranging the tray with some dishes and even putting the tray under the sink, I ran back to my room to get a pair of chopsticks and came back to the common room. As I turned the corner, I saw the same flash of the girl kneeling above the kitchen sink. Instinctively, I jumped back and looked up to the spot again. The tray that I had arranged neatly on the bottom cabinet was back up on the shelf leaning to the right…

Not daring to squeal, I ran back to my room again and convinced myself that one of the tall boys in my dorm could have easily put it up there during the time I was searching for my chopsticks. Snatching my food out of the microwave, I walked back to my room taking a last glance at the tray. Someone else must have moved it that night, because it took its place under the sink for the rest of the year. Once in a while, though, I would turn the corner into the kitchen, see a flash of the same girl, and do a slight jump again.

Towards the end of the year, my traffic to the common room slowed as I took over the middle study room for entertainment instead. There was one night, though, when everyone was out partying on some weekend night. I came out to the common room with a strange urge to do something. No one was around, so I just sat down on a couch and shifted through the stuff that was on the table. Looking at my cell phone, I checked that it was 1:12. I took up a copy of the Rolling Stones magazine and started flipping through the pages. All of the sudden, my hand stopped. No, my whole body froze…

Suddenly acutely aware of my surroundings, I noticed that there was no sound to be heard. It wasn’t quiet– it was completely silent. Not even the sound of air moving against my ears. I felt a few light pinches and was bewildered because I haven’t felt a presence since the beginning of the school year. Then I felt something breathe against my ears, that wet air moving you can feel when someone is trying to whisper in your ear. I heard the lowered voice of a woman…

“Don’t tell anyone that you saw…”

For some reason, I was really itching to ask “…saw what?” but my mouth stayed frozen. I felt my hair being flattened and run through, then a hair band or crown or something being put on my head. A pinch here and there on my thighs. The voice started repeating “So relieved… We girls have to stick together… Don’t let the boys get…” in the exact opposite of a stage whisper. There was no hollowness to the voice, just low drowsy murmurs. As the voice chanted, I felt myself struggling to stay awake and conscious.

All of the sudden, I heard some noises coming through from one of the hallways and my hand followed through the flipping motion. A couple of students from the next hall were passing by. I noticed that my arm felt super tired and tried to check how long I had been frozen like that. My cellphone showed the time just as the minute clicked over to 1:13…

Convinced that I had a lucid dream, I reasoned against feeling a stronger presence than a touch. I had stronger recognition only a couple of times and those encounters were only for a few seconds or so. This one seemed like it lasted for 15 minutes, but my clock showed that it had been less than a minute. Besides, I saw that the building must have been 15 years old, tops, and never did I feel a presence in such a new building.

I wrote it off to the stress of school and finished the year without mentioning it to anyone. Soon enough, I totally discarded the experience as a dream and forgot about it. Today, I was surfing the web and stumbled over the history of my school. I looked up the page on the building and read that it was erected and populated in the 70’s, not the 90’s as I thought. Feeling slightly creeped out, I still reasoned that the school, with its reputation in those days as an old boys’ club, did not go co-educational until the 80’s. Then, I read this sentence under the dorm’s history: “In the early 1970s, as the college began to accept female students, there was a demand for more housing…” Early 70’s was about the earliest building that I’ve sensed anything in.

But wait. I read on. The specific building I lived in was first occupied by frat members who formerly lived in Brooks. By men. No woman would have a reason to inhabit there after death. It probably was much later that female students inhabited this building. I was puzzled and wondered why it was a woman who asserted her presence so strongly.

And then, I remembered her words.

“Don’t tell anyone you saw… So relieved… We girls have to stick together… Don’t let the boys get…”

The creepy smoothing of my hair and the pricks on my thighs felt even more sinister as I imagined what these words might have hinted at.

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Once, I walked into the house of someone who had recently relocated to my town. The previous owner was rumored to have been a monster of a father to his many children who died young. (It seemed to me crazy that in such a close-knit town, such a horrific rumor can go around without a word or action springing from it.) I walked into one room and immediately felt three hands grabbing at mine, shaking. I had to bolt out of the house under some pretense. The experience undermined my belief that I felt the friendly presence only at places where these spirits felt fond of. I neglected the fact that while some people wipe out the horrors they experienced, some replay it over and over in their mind until the horror becomes engraved in their lives.

Uncategorized

July 27, 2010

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The Inceptions

Perhaps the critics are right– “Inception” is more of “The Matrix” than “Space Odyssey”.  I think that instead of making an excellent action film or an exceptional psychological play, Christopher Nolan chose to work for a film that combined realistic action, mental puzzles, and emotional journey all at once. It’s something a few dared to even strive for, and all often fail in doing so. In that sense, the director characteristically planted the inceptions of these possibilities into the minds of the audience, that a film can have great degree of action, puzzle and emotion without sacrificing one of the three. The dialogue was hesitant at times but the plot itself was smart and moving. The cinematic effects were well used and not so corny: the explosion of boxes, the impossible architecture of the dream, the slow motion as the indication of parallel time– they all meant something without looking too cryptic.

As Ariadne marvels at the attention to detail that the dream world can accommodate, I couldn’t help but marvel at the film’s ability to absorb all of these details as well. The subtle focus changes, the audacity to use actual physically rotating hallways in the hotel scene to convey gravitational changes, which could totally have looked corny and outdated. The coincidence of Piaf’s song and Marion Cotillard’s character merging together was even enlightening than comical, which it very well should have been. The ending serves its purpose to whet the appetite rather than solely act to conclude the story.

And did anyone else notice? Nolan had stated that he had wanted to work with DiCaprio and Cobb was therefore the first role cast– as I look at a picture of them together, I could not help but notice a bit of the resemblance between the two. Is Nolan the architecture of our cinematic dream state, the reason why the film doesn’t let us cut off from its vivid images?

Thoughts

July 21, 2010

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Friends–

친구들아,
Friends,

난 매일 삶과 하루를 위해 기도를 한단다.
Every day, I pray for life and another day.
내가 죽는것이 두려운게 아니라 너희들이 행복하고 건강했으면하는 바램에 기도를한다.
I pray not because I am afraid of my own death, but because I wish for you to be happy and healthy.
매일매일 말로 표현은 못하지만 나는 내 친구들이 있어서 행복하고
I’m so happy because of my friends, although I don’t express it so clearly with words
늘 친구들이 아파할까봐, 슬퍼할까봐, 너무 걱정이 된단다.
But I’m always so worried about you being ill or hurt.

모두에게 비밀은 있겟지만, 너무 힘들뗀 나에게 기대줘.
Everyone has a secret or two, but lean on me when things get too tough.
나중에 몰라서 미안한거 보다는 나도 같이 아파주는게 나은거같애.
I’d rather be troubled now going through it all with you now than be sorry about not knowing later.
내가 무뚝뚝해서 말로는 쉽게 못하지만,
Usually, I’m really impassive and can’t say this very easily but,
사… ㅅ…살…사라…스아라…
I l… lo… lav… luh. luh…luv…
격.하.게. 아낀다 ^^ (격하게!!!)
I care for you very deeply ^^ (DEEPLY!!!)

Thoughts

July 14, 2010

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House (Center)

So there’s this website hits tracker on Dashboard and turns out that there’s a consistent at least one view per day on this blog. Awesome. But I’ve only gotten a few feedback on posts, so I think they’re random hits from people floating through the web.

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I ushered at the Williams Theatre Festival over this weekend for “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum” which is a musical comedy by Stephen Sondheim (alumni! Ahhhhh) Basically, we were prepped for half an hour on protocols and then thrown out to our jobs. I was taking tickets for the first balcony (and second, since the stairs going up was inside of the first balcony)  Those darn ticket stubs were harder to rip than I thought. I was trying to smile visibly, which is really hard for me (can I help it if people don’t recognize my radiant smile? Hahaha) and check tickets and direct people all at the same time. It was interesting because I have almost always been working on stage or behind stage, so had little experience being in the house.

The crowd at the festival was quite interesting too. There were the retirees from the Berkshire area and people on vacation up here in the mountains, but there were townspeople and faculty and even students who were going to see the show. Almost no one showed up with little kids, but teenagers were a visible crowd. Mostly, it was a New England crowd– however, I did note some people from England and France.

I closed the door and crept away towards the center from house left. There was a performer from the festival watching the show with me from the back of the balcony (it was a sold out show so we ushers had to stand) for a few scenes. Another audience member wanted to stand in the back with me because of obstructed view, but ultimately sat back down on her seat.

It was a great view from the house- I tend to enjoy looking down on stage rather than up, so first balcony center was the perfect place for me. Standing up, there was nothing blocking my view despite being vertically challenged. The show was, of course, fantastic– it’s really quite an under-appreciated musical  and the cast seemed to be comprised to seasoned professionals. Some of the actors lacked that comedic sense, but the leading role had great timing and gestures. It was lighthearted but quite witty and biting sometimes. Perhaps the songs were not quite as catchy, but the lyrics were alive and there were a few impressionable moments in the orchestra as well. I was, of course, thrilled at the idea of having one of the best views for free, though my feet were aching.

I was mostly amazed at how much they had done with the stage and the two short weeks they had to practice– a lot of the choreography were based on precision and MainStage isn’t exactly Broadway caliber. But they did well with the set (the same set from Camp Monster, with some pictures of Roman gods drawn on, I noticed) and there were no noticeable blunders.

After the show ended, we had to stay behind to collect programs from the seats and pick up trash. I kind of lingered behind when the audience left and stared at the stage for a bit. I kind of miss it from time to time, the idea of being able to escape in songs and stories, the ways that each performance changed every time and everything collected into a nice extract in the end. It was a lot of hectic and stressful times, but sometimes I still turn on those songs and think about how good it used to be. I met a lot of good people and a lot of good stories through the stage.

As I stared from the house, I knew I wouldn’t go back for a long time– maybe ever. It’s a blessing that I even manage to sing anymore at the collegiate level. But maybe, I might sneak into the theatre every once in a while and lay on the stage under the warm stage lights…

Thoughts

July 11, 2010

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The Illusion of Perfection

Last year, my school passed a program for an option for students to take a class they deem outside of their academic comfort zone without adding the final grade to their overall GPA, provided that there is an effort from the student and a maintenance of a grade close to their GPA. The class basically counts for none of the requirements for graduation except as a fill of the 36 classes required to graduate.

This Gaudino option was passed in order to encourage students to do something outside of their comfort zone. It’s a concept that is in the heart of the liberal arts education- a belief that students have the right to experience all things academic instead of forcing each to conform to a set curriculum. However, the idea that it didn’t count for any of the requirements made me wonder if it was ever going to be worth for a student to consider this option. You would have to maintain a high enough GPA in this class such that your overall GPA will really only be influenced >0.1 points if you choose to take it without invoking the option. For me, that means you might as well take a chance and end up fulfilling a requirement in a division that is your weakest. Mostly, it’ll be busy senior thesis students taking these classes, after already having fulfilled divisional requirements and needing a class they don’t quite have to spend as much time working for.

This is really an exposure on the core fault of the American higher-learning institutions– there is a tremendous pressure for students in top-tier institutions to present this image of effortless perfection. That with a pristine GPA from very difficult classes, you are proving your worth as a student and a person. It is true that GPA can be a good sign of one’s intelligence and work ethics. It is also true that at a place where the brightest, the cream of the crop from the world study their heart out, GPA can also be a great indicator of good luck and endless research on shortcuts to life.

I, like many students here, lived my entire life getting nothing but A’s and A+’s in high school. For as many students to succeed at Williams with a GPA of 3.5 or higher, there are just as many students who struggle under a workload that even professors deem almost impossible for one student to handle in such a short semester.

Quick shortcuts are easy to take: students look up information on factrak and will only take classes with professors who are labeled “easy graders”. Instead of taking intro college level chemistry, even students who find themselves “decent” in science and math choose notoriously easy courses specifically geared for non-majors. (Same goes with the science-geared students who try everything to get into the easiest humanities classes possible)

Having grown up in a town where academic competition was non-existent to my eyes, I was surprised at the first discussion of the use of drugs to aid academic success, especially during exams. Ritalin seems to be to Williams what steroids are to major league baseball: everyone knows at least a couple of friends who’ve tried it or use it regularly, but almost no one will admit such desire in public. To me, such acts are grotesque and absurd (Ritalin is for people with real learning disability, not someone who has a little bit of trouble focusing on intense work for hours and hours)– to this sleepy college town, it’s a thing that probably happens much more frequently than people think.

As impossible as it seems for people to even have the balls and the method to cheat in their classes, I hear stories from the Honor committee about students who are too proud to ask for extensions but not enough to trade integrity for a better letter. The professors make their exams a little bit more different, a little more abstract, to ensure that cheating will get you nowhere– yet students dodge these roadblocks and more people get away with stuff than the ones who are unfortunate enough to get caught.

Is this because Williams students are stupid and overall bad people? That can’t be the answer. Almost everyone I met here are extremely intelligent and have great personalities. There are times when I let my mind take a step back in a lunchroom conversation and marvel at my fortune to be at school alongside these people. Not only will people admit to liking their classes, they’ll actively promote their learning into the conversation so that I might learn too.

The perfection that we are all encouraged to achieve in this institution does not exist. This we simply know as facts– nothing in the world is perfect, except maybe the idea of imperfection itself. If this is the case, why do these students keep reaching for an unattainable ideal, equating a number to the amount of effort and intelligence one must prove to the world?

Try as hard as I might, I knew last semester that any grade over C in my Calculus III class was unattainable– it is impossible to skip rungs in mathematics and my level of comprehension in math really belonged to Calculus I or II at a collegiate level. But despite the horrific grade and the awful misery of sitting through a class where I was lucky to have understood one out of every 20 concepts we learned, I came out from the class being able to say that it was a very hard-earned C. Will a medical school committee try to understand why I got this grade in calculus? Probably not. But as long as I don’t choose to believe that a letter can reflect the amount of success in comparison to one’s abilities, I can still say that I tried my hardest in that class and do not regret earning a C.

The more I talk to the people here, the more I can’t help but believe that GPA alone can’t reflect the level of intelligence and work ethic that a person possesses. Students with high GPA could have skirted on good luck and false charms while students with low GPA could have chosen to challenge themselves despite their limitations. If you asked me to rank students I feel would become successful in the future, they will certainly not be in a descending GPA order. I commend those who choose to take on more than they could handle and a high GPA is only an indication that one has not tried nearly hard enough to push their boundaries and learn out of their comfort zone.

Thoughts

July 8, 2010

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Review: Chick-Parm at Pappa Charlie’s

I feel like Pappa Charlie’s is legendary among alumni here… and not quite so among the current students. I myself only stepped foot inside once before, getting something to drink when my parents and I were up here to look at the campus during those prefrosh days. It took me only a second to figure out why names of well-known actors adorn the menu on the wall, but my parents had no idea that any of these people on the wall were famous. Perhaps this is a mark of a serious actor– someone who is known more for their roles and face, not by their names necessarily.

Anyways. I was not willing to try a sandwich named after a celebrity– alas, I couldn’t bring myself to order the Neil Patrick Harris. Luckily, Chicken Parm was something included in the menu and something I can be fairly critical about since I have a definite idea what it should taste like.

My ideal Chick-Parm is this: on a white Italian bread (or Kaiser roll) with a chewy crust, a perfectly crispy breaded chicken cutlet topped with fresh-tasting tomato sauce and plenty of non-dried mozzarella cheese.

Pappa Charlie’s version of Chick-Parm was not bad, but seriously lacked in quality compared to its reputation (although, I guess, not in comparison to the price…) The roll was okay- a little bit heavy on the bread side for me, but the crust was nice and chewy despite not being an Italian roll.

The chicken was thankfully breaded, but not as quite as crispy as I liked. On a chicken parm, the sauce soaks into the breading and makes it soggy, which means that keeping the chicken nice and crispy will add a ton of difference to the sandwich later.

The sauce was the biggest disappointment for me, as the tomato sauce had that “straight-out-of-bottle” taste and was overwhelmingly salty for me. I kept thinking that it would be great if they could just buy a jar of sauce from Hot Tomatoes and put it on their Chick-Parm. On pizza, that chunky sauce is unimpressive for me, but the level of sweetness and the fleshy tomato texture could be interesting in this sandwich.

I expected the cheese to be the cafeteria dried-mozzarella variety, and it was. It’s hard to demand a deli to have great cheese for a sandwich I’m sure not many people order anyways. In any case, it was melted quite nicely by the time I got to the sandwich, although they could have loaded on more cheese than sauce.

Overall, the Chick-Parm from Pappa Charlie’s was disappointing according to my standards, but a pretty filling fare considering that it’s a sandwich on spring street and they never have real Chick-Parm in the dining halls anyway. I have a feeling that their fresh sandwiches would be okay– it seems like they don’t skimp on the ingredients and the breads are probably nice and hearty. It’s a pretty decent deli, if a bit pricey, and my food was delivered quickly, so I guess it’s not a bad option even with that Subway across the street.

I might try a celeb-named sandwich next time I go, though.

P.S. I’ve half a sandwich left… so I’ll be trying something with the leftover curry sauce I have from yesterday 😀

P.S.S. As predicted, curry addition did a lot to the sandwich. Spice Roots has this great Chicken Tikka Masala that tastes really buttery and has a very mild but present heat. I can have rice mixed with that sauce any day.

DAMN YOU SPICE ROOTS…. WHY ARE YOUR CURRIES SO GOOD, IT’S CAUSING A DENT IN MY POCKET….

Food

July 3, 2010

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