Not Eating Meat in Korea

I’m not a vegetarian, but Koreans call me one. At the moment I eat fish, it’d be almost impossible to survive here if I didn’t.

Korea and Koreans don’t understand what it means to be a vegetarian or to not eat meat. This is partly due to the fact that fish and meat are both called meat, 고기, pronounced like “gogi,” but fish is called “water meat” or 물고기 “mul-gogi.” However, it’s mainly due to the fact that people who don’t eat meat just don’t exist here. It’s extremely rare and in my 3.5 years, the only Korean I’ve heard of who is a vegetarian is one of the teacher’s husband. I’ve met Koreans who have said that other than me, they have never met someone who doesn’t eat meat. Meat is a staple in Korea and it’s almost always served in the school lunches. It’s the “main” portion of the meal and then there’s different kimchi sides and a soup, which usually has meat in it. The days when the main is meat and the soup has meat are the worst because then I’m having rice and kimchi. Sometimes the rice has meat mixed into it and then I’m basically eating nothing, so I snack on almonds, cashews and some fruit .

You may be wondering, “Joe, why don’t you bring your own lunches?” It’s a valid question, and the reason is, there is nothing you can buy at the stores like we have in the U.S, especially in the small town that I live in. It’s only Korean food. Sandwiches are not possible, grains other than rice don’t exist, the only cheese is plastic-like American, and the salad section consists of just lettuce. There’s not even anything I could buy to put into the salad. Also, due to the lack of ingredients my dinners have become pretty uninspiring as well. I’d love to be able to cook with cauliflower, mushrooms, beans, anything that’s commonplace in the U.S, but nonexistent here. My sister gave me a vegetarian Korean recipe book (which is awesome), and you’d think there’d be a lot of stuff I could make. However, I don’t think the author made it for people living in Korea, as there items I can’t get.

If you haven’t come to the conclusion yet, not eating meat in Korea is extremely difficult. I haven’t eaten meat for two years, yet the lunch ladies at my school’s who haven’t changed since I’ve been here will still try to give me meat. It’s funny, but it’s not and to me it’s represents the foreignness of this choice in Korea. Or, how little they care about me. When deciding to go out to eat, there’s not many choices for me, and it has made me feel burdensome to my friends because there’s like two places we can go. Even dishes that don’t normally have meat in them could come with meat, it depends on the chef and whether or not they decide to add some. Like a seafood soup with chunks of beef in it. To help you further understand how uncommon it is to not eat meat, even when I ask them to not put meat in something they will still put meat in it. I assume this is because they’ve made the dish so many times, adding meat is part of their automatic process. For example, there’s a Gimbap shop next to my apartment that makes the best tuna gimbap [a Gimbap shop is a small restaurant that serves cheap and quickly made food and they’re found in every town and city. The food is primarily “gimbap,” which is similarish to a sushi roll, they also have soups and other dishes like bibimbap, and tteok-Bokki.] Gimbap always comes with ham, so I always ask for, “no ham please,” the lady will acknowledge what I said, and then when I go to eat it, it has ham in it. It’s easy to take out, but it’s frustrating.

Two weeks ago I went out to dinner with some of the teachers from my school, and one of them can’t understand how somebody could not eat meat. He spent an hour telling me why I should eat meat, he doesn’t speak much English so most of this was done through a translating app and one of the other teachers. He used examples like, when smoking first came out they believed it was good for you, I wasn’t sure how that related, or,  when I walk I step on and kill ants. Again, I’m not sure of the thought process there. Most Koreans I’ve talked to don’t understand how I could get protein. They think meat is the only source. I was talking to my principal yesterday and she told me how her daughter (who’s 25) doesn’t like to eat meat, yet she (the principal) said she makes her daughter eat meat and will feed it to her when she’s home (the daughter lives in France). Another teacher told me that when I want to have kids, I have to eat meat so they will be strong and healthy when they’re born. I’ve been asked if it’s because I’m on a diet and even worse is that the teachers at lunch always stare at me and comment about me not having meat on my plate, they don’t talk to me though, just about me, while I’m sitting there. At this point, it’s not something new, it’s been 2 years and it shouldn’t still be a topic of conversation. Nothing makes me feel more ostracized.