KLB - Dwen Jang and Kamja


Julie's cooking up dinner and I'm starving. It was a long day teaching three classes, and I've worked up quite an appetite.




This is one of my favorite pan chan (sideshes). It's basically just fried potatos (kamja), carrots, onions and, of course, garlic.



Mmm. Sometimes I get on Julie's nerves looking over her shoulder, drooling, taking pictures, etc., while she's cooking.



And here's the main dish tonight: dwen jang chigae made from her mother's homeade, aged dwen jang (bean) paste. Mmm.


I almost had me a new kitten tonight. On the way home from work, I swung off at the post office to send out IOF books, and I heard, meow! meow! Actually it sounded more like, "mwack! meowack! moewooowo!" I wasn't sure if it was a cat or a dying bird. I poked my head in the bushes and saw the cutest little kitten shivering and meowing at me, its voice obviously worn out from crying. It was gray and black striped like a, well, like a minature gray and black tiger, I guess. As I was looking at it, a Korean guy came by, stuck his head in the bushes, then pulled out his phone and took a cam-phone picture, shrugged at me, then hustled off. I stood there for about 10 minutes trying to capture the little critter, but to no avail. Though it was just aboout a foot away, it wouldn't let me close enough to make the snatch.

It's damn cold and windy out there tonight and I felt bad, as I usually do when I see helpless animals cold and without food. So, I walked over to the nearby o-daeng-stall, and paid 500 won for a stick of o-daeng (boiled fish cake) for the cat. This seemed like a good idea, except you can't walk off with the stick because I'm assuming they wash and reuse them. So I stood there half eating the o-daeng imagining what an idiot I would look like to take half off the stick and walk away. On top of that, there were no other customers and the ajumma asked me a hundred questions in Korean about my job, where I live, what Korean foods I like, etc.

Well, finally, I bit off the last big chunk of o-daeng, thanked the woman, and scuttled off with the slimy chunk in my mouth. Back near kitten, I spit it out and set it on the stone wall in front of the bushes. The kitten practically screamed in delight at the smell, inched out, and chomped on its surprise dinner. Still, I was unable to get my hand on the cat and, after standing there for ages pretending to talk on my cell-phone while people looked at me oddly, I had to give up. At least the kitty had a little something to eat and maybe its mother will be back for it later. Or me and Julie!