In our bits of downtime, we renewed our efforts to learn Korean/Hangeul. Via food this time, of course.

There are these small neighborhood restaurants that sell kimbap and various local dishes. Like tofu stew, omelette wrapped fried rice, etc. Mostly franchises of a chain, but not all; and many of which are operated 24 hours. The menus are written completely in Hangeul. No pictures.

We have previously simply ordered items we knew about. So this time, our first attempt of actually deciphering the menu came with an error. We got fried dumplings instead of boiled dumplings.

That did it. We started learning the entire menu. Anything that sounded like an abominable combination, like cheese with kimchi, was conveniently left out. Armed with new bravery, we re-visited a week later. And succeeded in literally getting what we thought we ordered! Boiled dumplings, omelette wrapped kimbap, and pork cutlet over rice.

Simple things. Boosted by our success, we decided to move on to the simple topic of numbers. An hour at home, and we could both slowly handle our phone numbers, read out phone numbers on signs, and count money. These were however, just numbers in the Sino-Korean numbering system. A few days later, we felt it was time to devote another hour and master the native Korean numbering system, which is used practically in all areas related to counting.  Thus completing our mastery of numbers. Not so simple. It started getting complicated knowing which to use when. Especially when it comes to topics related to time, days, and dates. As the end of the hour neared, we gave up. I can count up to four in the native Korean system.  Not including zero.  I don’t even know if there’s a zero count or if it reverts to the Sino-Korean, which has multiple ways to say zero.

Meanwhile, the ten year old (Annie thinks that’s his age too) at the table next to us in the cafe is getting his weekend tutoring.  In physics.  I take a peek, one of the diagrams show one of those “object goes off  the top of platform, at bottom of the platform it achieves X m/s velocity, what is the height of platform?” questions.  I don’t know how early physics is introduced in today’s American education landscape. But it was definitely not at age ten for me back in competitive Singapore.

We can order dumplings in Korean. Yay.