How Korean Birthdays Go Down

It was my friend Stephanie's Birthday on Friday. She invited all of the teachers at the school out for lunch at the Sea House for all you can eat western style seafood buffet. I packed my stomach full of many different types of sea food. It was deliciously delicious! She followed the normal Korean protocol on Birthdays in Korea... It goes like this...

1- The birthday Girl (or boy) decides where they want to go and invites their friends the place of their choosing.

2- They only invite the people that they really want to come because in Korea it is tradition that the Birthday Girl picks up the bill!

3- It is customary to give money as a gift if you are invited or bring a cake. Since cakes are not easy to come by, as it is not that common to have an oven in your apartment, most cakes are bought at one of two popular chain stores that are located within 5 or ten minutes walking distance from anywhere in Korea- Dunkin Donuts or Paris Baguette. These cakes pretty much look like the cakes in Canada but usually they are much smaller. Although they look the same they sure don't taste the same. Everything western in Korean tastes a little off- cake is no exception. To me the cake taste like they loaded up on the butter and there is an overall lack of sugar in the icing... but none-the-less it tastes great (like many things in Korea the cake is an acquired taste).

4- In Korea they light the candles on the cake and sing "Happy Birthday" just like everywhere else in the world (I really wonder what nationality invented the song "Happy Birthday", I mean all languages sing "Happy Birthday"... Imagine the royalties if you wrote that baby- cha cha ching!!!). In Korea they have a special system for how many candles are on the cake. The tall candles represent 10 years and the small ones represent 1 year.

Because all of the teachers at the school love Stephanie and because we failed to decide who would buy the cake, Stephanie received 3 bathed cakes!!!