Being the foreigner

외국인 (wegug-in): literally foreigner.

I want one!

That’s the way Korean people tell to foreigners. First time I listened this word was in Busan, while I was visiting Hadeong Yonggungsa Temple (해동 용궁사). It was said to me for my friend Minjung because while we were visiting the temple she listened it more than once being said to me and she was laughing about. Since I knew what it means I listened more than once. I didn’t know if it was derogative to me, but it seems they say it in a funny or curious way.

I knew Minjung last summer in Camino de Santiago. Being there she told me that I was talking with everybody, even just buying or in a restaurant having conversations with sellers, waitress or whoever. So I see she was doing the same here in Korea and when I said her she told me that people, as she was with me, was asking her things about me as if I knew to eat with chopsticks, if I can manage spicy food, if I was her boyfriend, how she knew me, if I like Korean food,…

In Seoul I slip past more, as here there are more foreigners and people it’s used to them, but in Busan I noticed people look at me more, as it seems there are not as common. Anyway I thought there were more foreigners in Seoul as I asked my friend Hyosun (I knew here in Camino too and, as she lives in Barcelona, we have become good friends) if there were a lot of foreigners in Korea and as she told me yes I thought that there were as much as in Barcelona, where a 30-40% of people in the subway is foreigner, and there are not as much here, thought you can see all the day some.

Life octopus coiled ready to be eaten.

Today, for example, when I entered in a restaurant to dinner, there were just two people and the waitress and they keep looking at me and started to talk me. As I didn’t understand what they say one of them started to ask me in English where I am from, if I like Korean food and if I endure with spicy Korean food. I think this has been because in the neighbourhood where I’m living, Wangsimni, wegugins are not usual and them have been surprised seeing me there.

Those two men in the restaurant were eating life octopus coiled in the chopsticks (I have to try it). And for me, as I go to that restaurant some times for being close to where I life, they serve me what they want, knowing that they can’t talk with me, and today it has been a thick soup of fish including fish eggs and different types of fish internal organs which I have not been able to identify but tasted good.