My Memory

My Memory
I was visiting my daughter in Penang sometime way back in 2002 or was it 2003, I forget which. Every time my grand-daughter sat down at the piano she would be playing this same song over and over again. It was a haunting melody and I quite liked it So I asked her for the title of the song. She asked me back in a surprised tone, grandma, aren’t you following the Korean drama Winter Sonata on tv, It’s called “my memory”?. You should see it, there’s an episode showing tonight. So that night the whole family gathered around the tv to watch “Winter Sonata.” By then it was already into the 18th episode where Joon Sang and Yu Jin were getting married secretly but it never happened because Sang Hyuk came and dragged Yu Jin away. Later Joon Sang went to Yu Jin’s house and they drove to the seaside together. It was supposed to be their last time together because Joon Sang had decided to leave Yu Jin. He had called Sang Hyuk earlier to come and pick Yu Jin up. So during the night while Yu Jin was sleeping he had slipped away. The next morning Yu Jin could not find Joon Sang but Sang Hyuk was there waiting for her. This episode was so touching, I even cried. They were such a lovely couple, how could I not fall in love with them. So the next day I told my grand-daughter to take me to the video shop to buy the whole set of CDs of Winter Sonata. I could not wait to see the story from the very beginning. I didn’t sleep that night because I watched all the episodes, 30 of them at one go. So that’s how I was introduced to Korean drama. From then on I became a big fan of Bae Yong Joon. I even joined the Bae Yong Joon Fan Club in Malaysia (BMF) and the Bae Yong Joon Fan Club in Singapore (Joon Family). BMF just celebrated our 6th anniversary on 16th May and we’re still going strong. I’d like to mention here that BYJ is the current FACE for the Korean line of cosmetics, The Face Shop.
So one thing just led to another, I surfed Bae Yong Joon’s websites in Korea and also the websites of his fan clubs all over the world. I made scrapbooks and pasted all that I had cut out from newspaper and magazine articles. I started to surf the drama sites and found some very good sites for synopsis of the dramas written in English. In that way I knew in advance what the story was about and who were the actors and actresses even before the dramas were aired on our local tvs. Now that I come to think of it, the Korean dramas seem to have influenced me a lot in my views and thoughts about Korea. As I love cooking, I like to try out recipes of the different cuisines in the world. I enjoyed “Jewel in the Palace or Daejanggeum” very much because there was so much of cooking shown in that drama. Actually I had learned to prepare my first Korean dish in the eighties, during a trip to visit relatives in Bangkok, a dish what the Thais call “Korean Beef Genghis Khan”. Only today, this dish is better known by it’s famous name Bulgogi which can be found on the menus of the many Korean restaurants here in Kuala Lumpur and throughout the world. The beef was so tender and tasted so delicious that I had to ask my hostess for the recipe. Actually there’s no cooking involved here only grilling of the beef. The beef (tenderloin) was cut into thin slices then marinated in a sauce made up of soy sauce, sesame oil, minced garlic, sesame seeds and other seasonings. Well after the beef had been marinated, it was grilled on a dome-like shaped pan that was placed over a charcoal brazier at the table. I would say it looked like an inverted wok only that it had a trough around the edge to which a little water had been added. This trough also served to catch the tasty juices oozing from the beef which combined with the water to produce a tasty soup. The grilled beef slices were then eaten as they were or wrapped in a lettuce leaf along with slices of fresh garlic and green pepper and a dab of soybean paste and red pepper paste. Then why Genghis Khan? Probably because the Thai-made cooking pan looked like the metal hat that Genghis Khan wore on his head I suppose. I bought five of these Genghis Khan “woks” to bring back to Malaysia where I introduced a lot of people to this Korean dish. Somebody borrowed my Genghis Khan “woks” to have a party and never returned them to me. I wonder if I still can get them from Bangkok now?
“Hwang Jiny" the story about a very famous 'gisaeng' in the Joseon Dynasty is one of my favorite dramas. I was very enchanted by the many dances so beautifully performed in the drama which must have been very difficult to dance. I just love the beautiful hanbok worn in this drama, I believe more than 600 hanbok were specially designed for this drama and more than half of these were worn by the leading actress Ha Jiwon. She won the Best Actress Award at the 2007 KBS Drama Awards whilst “Hwang Jiny" won the award for the Best Mini Series at the 2007 Monte Carlo TV Festival. Here’s a video from Utube taken from the drama, enjoy it. Hope it works it's at the bottom of the page. And with it I end today’s post. But before that I’d like to recommend you to go to this website:- http://english.visitkorea.or.kr it belongs to the Korea Tourism Organization (KTO) where you can get lots of valuable information about Korea. Or if you prefer you can go to the branch office of the KTO here in Kuala Lumpur at Korea Plaza where you can get lovely brochures of Korea. Not only that, you can even enroll in their free Korean cooking classes, Korean Language classes and Korean Singing classes. You can even enjoy free Korean Movies and Dramas and Korean Cultural performances. See you next time