january 2, 2009

the remaing days in LA weren’t wasted.  in the morning, our family had a tradition korean 세배, which is a practice where the children peform a new year’s bow to the elderly.  in return, the elders give the 세배-ers money.  it’s a bit of a big deal in korea, especially if you have a lot of family.  my family then went shopping in ktown, mostly for my sister since she was leaving on saturday.  but first, we had to eat lunch at myung dong kyoja for some knife noodles (칼국수, ㅎㅎㅎ).  this is a very famous place in korea, and used to be my favorite place to eat as a youngster growing up in korea.  when i visit korea, i still often find myself out to this special restaurant!

(the noodles…)

(with some 물만 두 …)

(can’t forget the kimchi’s!)

(droooool)

(kinda random… but who sells korean bacon like this?! hahaha, looks good though…)

for the last family dinner, despite korean bbq’s awesomeness, there was no way my sister and i were going to eat it again (we had it yesterday, again, with family friends).  my sister suggested sushi, and it was a great idea.  we went to one of our favorite spots, mitsuwa marketplace to pick up some fresh sushi, sashimi and rolls.  we couldn’t find everything we wanted, so we made a second stop at another japanese market called nijiya market.  very similar to mitsuwa, but smaller.  after picking up the food, we came back for some good old japanese food.

(if there is one thing my family does well, it’s eating!)

(blue fin tuna and yellow tail sashimi)

(probably one of my favorites…. the seaweed is kept so fresh, it’s amazingly delicious!)

(and of course, my family never skips alcohol)