after: the meaning of it all

months have gone by, and I think I left a chuck of my heart and my mind back at the trip. 

at first, it almost felt like a reverse culture shock to come back home to the small city of golden and try to adjust back to normal life again. the convenience stores shelves are not filled with onigiri or kimchi stews that are quick to grab, actually good for you, and delicious like in seoul;  rather eating anything from the gas station aisles in the u.s might give you awful food poisoning. everything closes way earlier in golden compared to bangkok; after 8 pm it's a ghost town here. regardless, there are some things i was super excited for, like my deathly craving of chipotle (as mentioned in the last blog) and seeing my family of course. i still miss the new found independence and sense of adventure i experienced while traveling in asia, but by leaning into this project and sharing the stories of my travel, i have found small ways to relive those feelings and not forget them. which is what brings me here, to the conclusion.

i finished putting together the cookbook/journal that holds all the memories and people i met on this trip. it was kind of a long journey because every time i sat down to write anything, i felt overwhelmed with a certain way i wanted the pages to look and i wanted to make sure the translated interviews were giving the interactions justice, on the other end, i was really enjoying re-living the whole experience and flipping through the pages filled with some of the best days of my life. in the end, the book came out to be exactly what i wanted it to be, and i think a lot of that confusing journey to get to it became an addition to its chaotic yet authentic vibe. in the end of each section i wrote for either country, i also wrote down some conclusions and expectations that were broken on the trip, starting with how i expected i was going to be perceived and treated in each country. according to the preliminary research I had done before the trip, here were my expectations:

    1. South Korea was going to have less diverse foods (besides Korean) and the vendors might not be as willing to talk to me due to "assumed" racial biases more common in South Korea

    2. Thailand was going to be a hub for street food culture and English would be an easy way to communicate with the vendors. 

    4. Most immigrant street food vendors might have a reason for their business greater than just money, such as culture preservation or sharing of culture. 

    3. I was going to find similar values of food abroad as I do in my personal life and culture. 

i'll shock you, only one of those statements came out true, and that is the last one. In summary, English was not useful...or helpful..not in South Korea, not in Thailand. I had a really hard time communicating with vendors for interviews and often their frustrations with my struggle would drive them to dismiss the interview. Contrary to my expectation, while in South Korea, if I encountered a similar situation to that described, more often than not a stranger who spoke Korean and English would offer their help to me, and even if someone didn't, the vendors were much more patient with my translating apps. While in Thailand, the street vendors were often very busy and constantly moving so striking up a conversation was already difficult and due to the popular tourist atrractions of Bangkok, most people's English was only in terms of marketing and appealing to the tourists who wanted to have fun, not learn about the culture. 

while in Seoul, Busan and Suwon, majority of the time i approached a street food vendor and asked them about their work, they had more wholesome answers or would dive into the origin stories of how they got started, while in Bangkok, the same question I asked was often responded with the vendor telling me whatever answer would get me to buy their food, and their motive was mostly "money"; what they served changed on what the tourists liked or what was popular at the time. Despite this, a common theme between two nations that most strongly supported my thesis going into the trip:

                        how food was more than sustenance, it was culture and it was pride. 

In all instances when I finished asking the vendor about their business and actually got to try their food, they would all talk a little about the recipe and what makes it special. While serving it to me, they would tell me a little about history while also marking which sauces or toppings go best with everything. When I asked the vendors what food meant to their culture, their response was never "well you need food to live", but rather how it values a part of their nation's identity, their culture, or their family. This common thread allows to make a new conclusion, one that I did not foresee going into this project. Even if food is served for tourism or just as a means of money, more often than not the vendor agrees with as a form of expression, and in many cases my research showed that expression as love and representation.

Looking back now, there were points during my research that I was tunnel-visioned into thinking that my research and thesis was going to play out perfectly, and everything I had studied, would be true. I think I subconsciously did this to try to ease my research, because if there are no surprises, then I was right about everything! Well.. that's no fun.

I think what I gained most from exploring this topic is realizing how different we all are around the world, and that is not something that we can expect on pure research, but there are forms of expression that unify us in ways that are unexpected. \

A symphony of a song, even if it's in a language I can't understand, he smile of sweet old vendor as she recalls how she started her business 50 years ago, and the first taste of a meal that no matter how unique it is to you, the love feels familiar. This is what I want you all to take away from my journey, and maybe open up your perspectives to seeing food as a means to live, but rather view is as an expression. My Persian mother instilled food as love so hard in me that it drove me travel across the world and seek and share it with other, and when I found that South Korea and Thailand were able to offer me that, I was in awe. The immigrant communities although small in some areas that I traveled, retain so much of their power and self expression through food, and we are advancing in a world where the variety of food is not judged and looked down upon. Even if some immigrant vendors in Bangkok are capitalizing off of the popularity of Pad Thai, or Turkish immigrant vendors purposefully setting up a Kabob stall on Itaewon awaiting their drunken customers,  it is advancing the value and visions of food beyond what the world has previously experienced. In my paper I briefly touched on food neophobia which is “the tendency to reject or be reluctant to try new/unfamiliar foods”, and I can confidently say, I did not witness that in my travels in Asia.

I can go on and on about this, and I don't think I'll ever fully shut up, but for now, I wanted to say thank you again and again for this amazing opportunity. I cannot wait to take these new perspectives and take them even further, travel more, eat more, feel more. No matter how much yummy food I eat, I won't be satiated as this hunger for exploring won't leave me alone, and it's going to drive me to explore my world.

Thank you McBride, bye for now!

p.s I hope you are reading this, so thank you Justin, for making this dream of mine come true. you have always believed in me when not a lot of people did, and I am forever grateful for that. I know you are going through hard times so I wanted to remind you that you are the best advisor, professor and friend to me. Thank you for fostering and guiding my hunger for curiosity (and food) these past three years, I would not be here without you.

love, 

parmida