KEY TO KOREAN (키 투 코리얀)

17 THINGS TO KNOW

17 THINGS TO KNOW BEFORE YOU GO TO SEOUL:

1. It’s not arrogance: it’s pride. “You know kimchi, yes?” “Delicious, yes?” Questions like these are offerings meant to welcome, but also to impress. This is how Koreans express national pride. It is earnest and often endearing. It can take the form of Samsung small talk and soju samples. It calls for Ban Ki-moon mentions and K-pop dances. Every local from your bartender to your cabbie is a cultural ambassador, ready to teach you what it means to be Korean. Even a basic awareness of Korean cultural staples will go along way in making you friends on the ground. Note: inside South Korea, as it’s referred to on the world map, the country is known simply as ‘Korea’.

2. Confucian manners rule. In the Land of Morning Calm, Park Geun-hye may be president and Yang Sung-tae chief justice, but Confucius is king. He reigns over every part of Korean society, imposing virtues, structure, and sense. In cosmopolitan, ultra-modern Seoul, traditional Confucianism is the fuel that powers the city’s hums and happenings—all the small interactions between families, friends, lovers, colleagues, neighbors, generations, and strangers that collectively make up life. For the novice, the system is nuanced in some ways and not at all in others: speak to elders with care and politeness (Korean has special honorific speech for this), never refuse a host’s invitation to dine and drink together, offer your bus seat to the greying lady who’s standing. At its core, Korea’s identity is all about social harmony.

3. Seoul is a sardine can. With a metro population of over 25 million—half Korea’s total—Seoul is like a Dhaka-and-a-half, with congestion rivaling Shanghai, Mexico City, and New York. The subway system is the world’s most crowded. Seoul’s public spaces are packed with pedestrians, vendors, marketers, and food stands. Mix the high density with a social system that emboldens feisty old ajumma ladies and ajeoshi men to push you out of their way, and you’ve got the chaos that defines Seoul. But at the right place and time, this city can be peaceful, too. Wander into a Buddhist temple once the ceremony is over. Stumble down a winding back alley away from the crowds on the main drag. Grab these moments when you can: you may not have another opportunity for days.

4. Beware black cabs. If you accidentally hail one, you’ll be hit with a big bill at the end of the ride. More expensive than their non-black counterparts, Korea’s “deluxe taxis” charge a premium for their supposedly safer and more trustworthy services. But they’re rarely worth the extra money. Instead, just hop in a regular taxi, which in Korean is taxi; tell the cabbie where you want to go, followed by ka juseyo (go please); and make sure the meter is running—then buckle up and hold on tight.

5. Street food is always there for you. Celebrate the fall harvest Chuseok with songpyeonsweets. Nurse a hangover with haejangguksoup. Bond with new friends over a loaded table of banchan side dishes. Koreans hold dear an endless array of food rituals, but they are most sentimental about the street snack: warm goldfish-shaped bread stuffed with sweet red-bean filling; paper cups of chewy ddeokbokki rice cakes with explosive spice that stains your mouth red; sugary cream-frosted waffles. Korea’s street food is plentiful and varied. Sometimes it’s whimsical: spiraling skewers of potato chips, or hot dogs encased in French fries. Other times it’s homey: battered and deep-fried peppers, odeng fish cakes swimming in a salty broth. Koreans know these foods will be waiting for them, lining Seoul’s streets at all hours of the day and night. You’ll come to count on them, too.

6. Check your chopsticks. Korean chopsticks are made of metal, and are therefore more slippery than wooden ones, which can take some getting used to. Koreans won’t care about your chopstick skill level, but they might judge you for your chopstick etiquette. Sitting down to a meal and picking up your chopsticks before your elders do is considered rude; so is using them to dig around looking for something specific in your food. Don’t wield them as a spear or skewer. And certainly don’t position them like a stake, sticking vertically out of your bowl. When you finish eating, return your chopsticks to their original place on the table. If it all feels overwhelming, rejoice in this: you are not obligated to pick up every tiny grain of rice with chopsticks; in Korea, it’s customary to eat rice with a spoon.