Noticing culture over in Seoul

I wrote this issue last week but figured I’d publish it after I returned from my travels, since I was on a tourist visa.

Entering Korea as someone who looks ethnically Korean but isn’t has been an intriguing, yet ultimately hollow experience. Greeting people with a happy “Annyeonghaseyo,” and then ultimately disappointing them, and then multiply that experience by hundreds of instances, is a minor inconvenience at best, and a somewhat bittersweet experience at worst. It gave me the very curious feeling my fellow journalists described back in Paris, when they greeted locals with “Bonjour,” only to be struck with an onslaught of French they couldn’t comprehend.

Much nuance was lost. Communication with locals involved halting single-word sentences of Korean and English. An example:

Korean stew restaurant owner: Where [are you from]? Ilbon [Japan]?

Me: America. USA.

Owner: (looks confused)

Me: (swapping over to Chinese) Meiguo.

Owner: (realization dawns) Migook!

(Silence befalls us as that exchange was somewhat exhausting)