A Culture Difference - lunch with a friend

During last summer, I was enrolled in the ESL classes of Miramar college. Generally speaking, most of temporary residents like me take a long distance trip during summer vacation. I , however, went to the ESL school, for I have another chance of trips next year with whole family.

I met two friends from Japan. We met each other once a week to chat for about 4 hours. One of them invited me for lunch at her house last week because I am leaving for Korea in a week.

We coincided in a lot of things because of either our similar cultural background -Asia cluture circle - or the same status in the United States, say, a foreigner.
Conversation with her was really pleasant, delightful, and cheerful. Through the talking, I got to know her better. But, it is time to part with her. So sad.

She prepared for Japanese traditional dishes. Hundreds of Japan-style restaurants have been opened in Korea so Japan food feels like the hometown taste to me.

Rice and soup are staple food in Asia. They are basic and we have extra side dishes. As alawys, we had rice, miso soup, and five side dishes; fried sticky rice topped with radish leaves and grinded radish, boiled loctus root down in soy sauce, another radish thing-I like it most, some dumplings, grilled vegetables wrapped with fried bean curd. They were great and suited my taste.

However, I had a problem, that is, there were no spoon on the table. Since our Korean table setting included spoon and chopsticks, I thought my friend's country was the same. I assumed she must forget to set up the spoon. Our meal just started, so she probably detected her mistake soon, I hoped. Actually, I did not want bug her by asking spoon. I decided to wait until she found it by herself.

By the time she was about to eat miso soup, I anticipated that she was a little bit embarrassed with no spoon. However, she just raised the bowl of miso soup up to her mouth, and drank. She did not look astonished. She was the same as usual. Oh my god! It was me, not her who got embarrassed. After all, I drank the soup in the same way she did.

I never knew that Japan people do not use spoon at table. After talking about my puzzlement, we bursted into laughter. She also did not become aware of my perplex.

If Korean people held up the bowl to their mouth when they took a meal with guests, they could be regarded as not having good-manner of dine. We usually eat the soup by using spoon. No drinking! Some men drink the soup, but it was not unusual to young women. So, think of how embarrassed I was when I saw her drink up the soup. ^^

We detected a Culture difference between us! It was very trivial, but very funny. Thanks for yammy lunch. Rico! I won't forget you ever though we are parted physically. I miss you a lot, too. ^^