One thing that bothers me is once in a country you are often confined to a very small selection of foods which seem to be repeated continuously until you leave. In Spain the offerings of jamon, paella, patatas bravas and tortilla are unending. Perhaps it is a matter of what you can decipher in another language and perhaps it is what tourists are offered, because I know that if you step out of the tourist zone the offerings are more varied and interesting.
So a surprising experience in South Korea has been the enormous variety of food we have been offered. You think of Korea as the Korean hotpot or the Korean barbeque or a variation of Japanese food. In fact there is a lot more to experience such as bibimbap (mixed rice), kimchi (fermented fish and vegetables), Korean pancake. The list goes on.
Perhaps the fantastic variety is a product of a county where few westerners venture. Menus are not designed to please a western palate and we are truely eating what Koreans enjoy when they go out to eat.
And so we have left Korea, and there are a lot of stories of our fantastic time there under The Orient 2013 > South Korea. Like the food, all our experiences were different – unexpected and interesting.