A Second Brief Encounter with Hong Sangsoo

Not only have we been to BFI Southbank to see his film, we were also invited to a reception organised for Hong Sangsoo by the Korean Cultural Centre in UK (KCCUK). I don’t know for sure how it happened, probably by some sort of mistakes, but I was only too happy to oblige.

The reception was held on Monday 6 September at the Korean Cultural Centre near Trafalgar Square. Unlike what I expected there were not many people at the reception and I think the 24-hour tube strike which started that evening was somewhat accountable for the low turnout.



The Korean Cultural Centre was displaying some pictures and information about the director and his films. There were a couple of TV screens showing scenes from his films. Most impressively, there was a wall dedicated to his works in the basement where the centre’s library is situated. The wall was covered with his film posters along with the depiction of a pig’s bottom – a very cute reference to his debut work and the director’s autograph.



The reception itself seemed rather uneventful in general. There was someone from Independent Cinema Office who spoke a little bit about Hong Sangsoo and his first UK retrospective. When introduced, our man Hong Sangsoo himself only spoke briefly to thank everyone for the invitation and welcome.

Most of the time the director spent his time outside smoking and speaking on the phone. I felt rather sorry for him as it looked like he wasn’t comfortable being there. I thought the evening was going to end like this. We were having drinks and food while he was spending time away from us. However, we were encouraged to ask him any questions we would like to ask. When he came back in, he happened to come and sit next to us. To my surprise, he remembered seeing us at the BFI Southbank even mentioning my little brother. So we chatted for a little while, I mean mainly Rob with him.

During our private conversation, Mr. Hong said that Rob reminded him of a famous American actor. Even before he said the name of the actor, we knew it was Paul Newman. Believe it or not, quite a number of people (most of them happened to be Koreans) have already said the very same thing to him. Looking at the picture below, you may not agree with them, but it’s 100% true and it became one of our little jokes. Now that a prominent film director had approved it, we felt quite safe to talk about it. It certainly was the highlight of our evening, which made my lovely husband a very happy man and Mr. Hong Sangsoo his favourite Korean film director.

Hahaha - A Brief Encounter with Hong Sangsoo

First of all, this is a very belated post entirely because of my laziness. The event I’m writing about happened about a month ago from now, to be precise, on 3rd September 2010.

Going back to the story, I was very excited to learn that there would be the first UK retrospective of Hong Sangsoo’s complete films at BFI Southbank (here for more detailed information). This was definitely an opportunity not to miss. However, mainly because of my husband’s work commitment, I could only book a couple of films. The first one we went to see was the preview of Hahaha, Hong’s recent film (not the latest though, that being Oki’s Movie showing at BFI London Film Festival). There was also a session called ‘An Evening with Hong Sangsoo’ after the film, but we thought it might be too late for us. Still quite unexpectedly, but very appropriately, the director was briefly introduced to the audience at the start of the film. In short, the film was brilliant - very funny and wonderfully acted. I liked the fact that the present narrative scenes were in black & white as if they were the still shots of the past whereas the past stories were presented as if happening at the present. To my relief, my husband also enjoyed the film immensely. Without doubt, I think the endless drinking scenes by both men and women amused him the most.

When we were having a quick drink at the bar as you do here at BFI Southbank, I spotted our respected director walking past. Encouraged by Rob, I managed to walk up to him to say hi. He seemed a very quiet and pleasant man in person. I also thanked him for the enjoyment we had from the film. Not knowing what else to say, I mumbled something quite silly. Yes, I then told him that my little brother was doing his Master’s in film studies in Paris and I wished he would make as good films as his in the future. I know I felt like a winner of the most embarrassing old sister of the year but never mind. It was such a brief encounter that he wouldn’t remember much about me (or so I thought).

Anyway, I am very happy to report that this whole retrospective thing initiated me to become a member of BFI and now I’m going back to BFI Southbank quite regularly.

Chuseok and Songpyeon

As much as I love all sorts of bread, pastries and cakes, I love my rice cakes, called tteok (떡) in Korean. Korean rice cakes are often made with glutenous rice and thus quite chewy for many western people, but for us Koreans that's one of the good things about them. Another thing is most of time they are not too sweet and can be eaten as good healthy snack. Quite sadly it doesn't seem that many of the younger generations in Korea appreciate the traditional rice cakes as much as we used to do.


I would say the most important festive season in Korea is autumn when the weather is at its loveliest and there is an abundance of fresh produce from the new harvest. Some might argue that the New Year is more festive but personally I think Chuseok in autumn beats it. Okay. What is Chuseok? Chuseok (15th of August on the lunar calendar) is something similar to Thanksgiving and as turkey is to Thanksgiving; Songpyeon (a kind of tteok in the shape of half moon) is to Chuseok. I have fond memories of making Songpyeon with my grandma, mum and aunties on the eve of Chuseok chatting away or just listening to the grown-ups chatting. Grandma used to say that if we make nice looking Songpyeons, we will get a good looking husband. And I always thought I should deserve a handsome husband if I ever going to get one.


This year, for the first time in my life, I have made Songpyeon without any help from my mum. Of course, they weren't perfect I couldn't get some of the things that you would get easily in Korea, such as pine needles. They put pine needles between layers of Songpyeon in the steamer to give them the unique aroma as well as to prevent them from sticking to each other. Anyway, it was not a complete disaster at least and we all enjoyed them including my brother's family who were visiting us at the time.


PS) This year Chusoek was on the 3rd of October and this post is very long overdue.

Korean egg toast

My husband never says no to an egg (or to eggs more likely) and neither do I. The beauty of eggs is that you don't need to know much about cooking to enjoy them. Even if you just boil or fry them, they are simply tasty. As an inexperienced cook I like its simplicity and readiness, but of course I do understand that there are far too many ways to use them in cooking & baking. I guess Rob's favourite egg dish will be egg sandwiches whereas mine should be Korean omelette (계란말이). We both love eggs so much that they tend to appear on our shopping list almost without fail. Now that we are joined by another egg lover, my friend J, the egg consumption index in this household seems to have reached its peak.

A recent addition to our egg dishes is the 'Korean egg toast'. This is a kind of street food popular among the busy Koreans as breakfast on-the-go or just as snacks. Basically it is an omelette sandwiched between two slices of toasted white bread (I don't think we had brown/wholemeal bread in Korea). It is important to toast the bread in the frying pan/griddle with a little bit of oil. To make an omelette mixture, use one egg and some finely chopped vegetables such as onion, carrot and spring onion per serving. No need to add milk or water. When the toast is ready to be assembled in the frying pan, it is optional to add a slice of processed cheddar cheese. Believe me - it is better than the real thing! And finally some dash of tomato ketchup to go with it. Now enjoy!

PS: This picture shows the toasts made with wholemeal bread because we do not normally have white bread. Still I think the soft white bread will go better with this recipe.

Why Kimchi?

Like my fellow Koreans, I love Kimchi so much. There is a variety of Kimch dishes to begin with and it is also so versatile that you could use it in many Korean dishes. Unfortunately outside Korea, not many people seem to know about Kimchi at all. For those who has never tried it, Kimchi is a kind of raw vegetable dish made of mainly Chinese cabbage or radish with the seasoning of salt, chilli pepper powder, garlic, ginger, onion, spring onion and so forth. It is normally eaten after a couple of days when it starts developing unique flavour by fermentation. It is scientifically proven that it has a great deal of health benefits. It makes me feel very proud of my ancestors who came up with the recipe. How clever!

I came to the UK to study in the spring of 2002. Sadly I had to say goodbye to my beloved Kimchi because firstly, I didn't know how to make it myself. Secondly, I was just lazy and poor as I am now, so I wouldn't go and buy the relatively pricey ready-made stuff at the Korean grocery shops (not easy to find them unless you live in the central London or New Malden, Surrey). It was OK since although I loved my Kimchi very much, I was known for having a versatile palate to cope with any kinds of food (maybe greedy in other words?). No one I knew really worried about me in that matter actually. They knew I would survive as long as there was any type of form of food available. Yes, that's ME!

Apart from the occasional encounters, my life was continued without Kimchi and I was more or less happy. Then I met Rob my husband back in 2006 and fell in love and all that sort. He is originally from Edinburgh and had never met any Koreans before me. Naturally he was very curious about anything Korean including food and I dutifully tried to let him sample as much Korean food as I could (not necessarily of my cooking though). To my surprise, he instantly liked Kimchi and became a huge fan. I was lucky because he was very open about different types of food and also liked spicy foods in general.

Anyway, when I was considering the name of this blog, I was thinking about food which will also reflect my identity. I was quite tempted to call myself - the lazy cook but I am hardly a cook and besides there was somebody else using this name. Hmm... How about Kimchi? Kimchi = Korean? OK, that will do.

The thing is that I love food but I am not really a good cook nor experienced in food industry as other people might have. Therefore, I know perfectly well that I am not qualified, in any sense, to run a proper food blog if you know what I mean. I am just very envious about people who can express themselves in their blogs. There are things I like to learn more about but I always have a list of endless excuses and I never seem to achieve anything. This is my humble beginning just to motivate myself to learn a thing or two about food and some other stuff as well. Yes, I would give it a go. I cannot pretend that I am an expert or a connoisseur in anything. So, this is from someone simply interested in food. Nothing more or nothing less. I hope this would take me somewhere, ideally somewhere nice. One can dream, can't one? But hope I'm not fooling myself here.