Sheep and Backbones

The picture at the top is from a cafe that kept a couple of sheep in front of the shop. If there was one thing I was not expecting to see in the middle of the city, it was sheep.

The second picture is of a traditional Korean dish, backbone stew. I'm not a real big fan of this one, although it did taste pretty good. It reminded of some type of dish that would be served in Star Wars, I know that's a bit immature of me to say. Some friends confirmed with me that I ate meat before ordering, I guess next time I should answer more specifically. One of my friends did point out that they thought it was cool that Koreans tend almost the entire animal, while in America we only have a relatively few cuts from our meat. I agreed with my friend, but pointed out that backbone meat is probably to be found in a hot dog. Backbone stew is usually considered a dish that elders enjoy more than the contemporary youth of Korea. On one hand I really wanted to enjoy the backbone stew, but I felt a bit too unfamiliar with the dish to be able to jump right in and think it was the best stew ever. All my friends who really enjoyed it were Korean American, so I'm assuming they've either had it before or at least had some familiarity with the dish.

I have everything booked for my trip regarding the GRE. Only having one month of studying is not an incredible amount of time to study compared to some people, but I hope I'll do well enough on the test. I'm looking forward to seeing Japan, although it would have been nice to be able to visit with out worrying about a test. It will be nice to have something to look forward to if I get accepted into the graduate program, and if I don't get accepted at least I'll have a larger vocabulary from the studying. My two favorite words that I've learned so far are 'circumlocution' and 'ineffable'.

I've found a few good burrito places to help with my craving of American food. I eat Korean food about six days a week, two/three times a day, so it's always nice to find a good burrito on the weekends. In America we take the variety of food we eat for granted. Although Seoul has many international restaurants, there are none in my direct vicinity, as I'm more in a traditional area of Seoul.