American Smell— The Big Stink

Late on New Year's Eve Gail, James, and I are wandering the streets of Hongdae searching desperately for a burger.  We had directions, and a map with a nice little penciled-in path, but we had no burger joint.  Bummer. We finally settled for Thai food, and turned down a side street with restaurants bunched up along each curb.  Then we spotted it: American Smell.  Certainly not the most enticing or appetizing of names, and it wasn't the place we were looking for, but something about it said: there is at least on big fat juicy burger on our menu just waiting to be devoured.

We walked up the black stairway into a brightly lit room and sat down in red metal chairs at a wooden table. The decor was...marvelous. Iron Man and Spiderman busted out of the walls, and a little row of Simpsons figurines guarded the window. The menu was simple and therefore wonderful. Delighted with the hat tip to my hometown, I went straight for the 'Louis' Lunch.'


James: So when did you guys open?
Waiter: 4:00 pm
embarrassed laughter from the waygooks
Gail: No, we mean, like...ever?
Waiter: Ahhhh!  Tuesday.


Yep, they'd been open a mere 7 days. Our hipster senses were tingling-- we'd struck foreigner gold!  The waiter continued to deliver good news. He gestured to the counter/cooler full of imported beer bottles, then directed our thirsty eyes to the various taps poking out from behind.  I could substitute cheddar for swiss. Then he said the magic words,"Fries included."

Louis Lunch actually came in between two perfectly toasted pieces of white bread on a bed of thin sliced, golden french fries to challenge Mickey D's. Layers of beefy burger, real swiss, juicy caramelized onions—and a flavorless Korean tomato slice—even remained untainted by the forbidden fruit (No offense to ketchup, I just kept it with the fries). The beer was cold and cheap, the fries salty and crunchy and plentiful, and the bill was so friendly that I tipped.

It turns out that writing an interesting restaurant review is actually pretty difficult, so here's where I'll tell you the things that you really care about.


The food was great, the price was gentle, and the location is thus:

마포구 서교동 402-12번지 2층 서울, 한국
Seogyo-dong, Mapo-gu, 2nd Floor 402-12 Seoul, Korea

So go check it out!

Busan, New Year's, DMZ

Yongdong Persimmon Festival

Adorable clock tower outside Yongdong Station

One day when I was living in Budapest I went to the élelmiszer downstairs to buy some veggies for dinner.  Back in our galley kitchen, I sliced open a tomato and out spilled a little confusion: the tomato was slightly slimy and sweet, with a hint of cinnamon.  It was delicious...but it was no tomato.  It was a persimmon and henceforth my love of persimmons flowered.

Naturally when I bumped into the Yongdong Persimmon Festival on the interwebs, I cleared my schedule.  The day came and I still hadn't found anyone who was willing to make the 3 hour trek with me, so I hopped on a KTX train and into an adventure.

It was surprisingly easy to get to the festival, despite how difficult it was to find any English directions or reviews.  The train dropped me off at Yongdong Station and the festival was a little less than a ten minute walk away.  I followed the red lanterns over a little bridge and around to the sounds of Korean music and smell of street food.

 Yongdong is the Holy Land of Fruit in Korea, a name which further attracted me to the festival for my favorite fruit.  But the festival was not just about eating-- there were demonstrations of different machinery for processing the fruit, performances, local wineries, and more.  It was not as large as I expected, but it seemed like a true neighborhood and cultural event.  I was the only foreigner I could spot.

My alien looks caught the attention of a few local news shows (or other promotional people, let's be real I have no idea).  I was asked four different times to be recorded tasting different vendors' variation on the dried persimmon, sampling sweet tea and persimmon candy, and saying in my terrible Korean "Yongdong persimmons are delicious!"

The fruits of my labor were many: I rode the train home with two boxes of dried persimmons, some whole and some sliced for snacking. And you know I snacked on the way. I figured out that you can ride the train great distances with a ticket but without a seat. This information would later prove handy (as future posts will explain).   And I saw and tasted something I'll probably never experience again.