the life of Brian

I spoke of the Strawberry Girl, right? Well, here's a tale about the Gimbap Man.

I know a fellow down at Top Mart whose name is Brian. That's his Anglo alias, anyway; he's Korean. I've dropped his name a few times in earlier works. He is employed at whatever the closest analogy is to the deli counter. He assembles, rolls and chops gimbap, slices chicken, and occasionally whips up some dumplings. (Gimbap is exactly like sushi, but different: ham and some vegetables rolled inside rice, which is itself wrapped in seaweed. The word gimbap literally comes from the word gim, for seaweed, and bap, for rice.) He does this for nine hours every day, fourteen hours on Sunday. Yes, I said every day. He has no days off. He works seven days a week, 52 weeks a year. He's a very friendly guy. He actually started up a conversation with Adam, Elaine and myself, respectively, as we frequented Top Mart (the corner store, about halfway between a convenience store and a full-blown grocery in size). His English is good, though not quite on the same level as our Korean coworkers'; we have to slow down a bit for him to understand, and most large or rare words elude him. We don't hold that against him at all. He can easily sustain a conversation. We feel pity for him, to be honest. First of all, we were flabbergasted when we learned of his work hours. So, to give him something to hope for, we invited him out for a drink. He doesn't get off work until 10:30, so we met up with him (a little belatedly) at the Local at 11:00 one Sunday night.

sidenote: "The Local" is our nickname for the nearest branch of Ganiyeok, a traditional Korean pub. It's a chain, but is nonetheless quite homey in feel. Its snacks are delicious, too: sugared peanuts, dried anchovies with gochujang (spicy pepper sauce), and if you care to fork over a little extra dough, chicken, sausage, and all manner of delightful, meaty nibbles are available. Ganiyeok means "way station" in Korean...you know, those out-of-the-way whistle stops on train lines that have poor attendance. There are wooden booths, low light (provided by Buddhist paper lanterns), and quiet music on the stereo. They were even playing American golden oldies the second-to-last time I was there. Whaddya know!

Ahem...where was I? Oh, right. So we invited Brian out. He seemed quite excited about it; he thought we'd managed to find him a new job (as we'd hinted previously that we'd try to do for him). Turns out we were just up for a drink, but he was still pleased. It was nice, he said, to be able to go out with foreigners and have a drink. He wanted to improve his English. It was that night, around that barroom table, that we learned the long litany of tragedy and hardship that is the life of Brian. The man's existence has been a catalog of mishaps, personal and professional. I reproduce it here in reasonable facsimile.

Brian is, first and foremost, a cook. As I stated, he makes the gimbap and jokbal (shaved pig's feet; pictured above) and the occasional dumpling or two down at Top Mart. His dream is to have his own restaurant. He fulfilled this dream earlier in his life; he had a small place down in the southern region of the island, frequented by travelers to the beaches and docks. Something went wrong somewhere. I don't know whether he was sued, or whether his license was revoked unexpectedly, or whether he just couldn't make a go of it; whatever it was, I'm sure it wasn't his fault. But the business failed. The restaurant closed. He lost all his money, every last Korean won. His wife left him and went to Busan, taking his young son with her. Worse yet, Brian's next girlfriend turned out to be a Runaround Sue. She had ten guys on the go in addition to himself, Brian assured us, all in different cities around Korea. The relationship didn't last long, and Brian was left with nothing more than a small piece of property to his name. It's the piece which Top Mart stands on, across the street from Reading Town. He rented it to Top Mart, technically, but the income wasn't enough to support him, let alone his son (and possibly, his ex-wife). So that's how he wound up working seven days a week, including a brutal 14-hour shift on Sundays when his assistant has a day off. The existence really is deplorable. It's a clean store, and honest work, but he has described it as being dreadfully dull: nothing but standing on your feet for hours on end, slicing, rolling or boiling the same old foods and serving 'em up to rushed customers. I imagine the poor man can't stand the sight of gimbap by now. He must put his son through school, academies, and college. He has little money, no days off, and in his mid- to late thirties, is probably going to be doing this for the rest of his life.

As you can imagine, he was grateful for the drink. He even tried to pay for himself, but we refused. It seemed the least we could do.

We have determined to try to help the poor sap. That night, Brian told us he needed two things above all else: capital and a foreign girlfriend. He needs money to send to his son and help him out of the scrape he's in. He needs a foreign girlfriend to improve his English (and therefore, his prospects). You may laugh or look dumbfounded as you read this, but it's a widely practiced Korean advancement stratagem: ensnare a significant other who's from an English-speaking country and you've got it made. It's the quickest, easiest, cheapest (and, potentially, the most fun) way to bone up on your fluency. (I've been thinking about trying the same experiment in reverse; I'm trying to learn Korean and there is a cute cashier down at Top Mart who looks to be about my age...)

We can't do much about the money, but we promised to see what we could do in the girl department. We've assured him that the next time there's a big foreigner get-together down at Jazz Bar or Arabian Nights (the most popular weguk watering-hole and the only club on the island, respectively) we'll invite him along and introduce him to the gang of eligible ladies. I hope to do more, eventually; I told him I'd look and see if I could find him another job, and I mean to do it. I might find some legal loophole that allows him to better his pay and hours, at the very least. So that's the story. Brian slaves away over a hot kettle of boiling chicken all day, rolling gimbap and dealing with harried shoppers, just to keep himself alive and keep his son going through school. No breaks, no vacations, no lazy days, no nothing: work, work, work. It's more than adding insult to injury given that his restaurant-related dreams were shattered, his wife left him, his next girlfriend was a tramp and his son is kilometers away.

I'll write more when Brian gets his happy ending.