Namdaemun and karaoke

Hyon came over this morning for a quilting lesson. Afterwards, her driver drove us to Namdaemun. Namdaemun is full of little shops. We started with a kitchware store. We looked at wrapping paper briefly then went to lunch. In America the health department would have shut this place down. The restaurant was very small and very crowded. So crowded that they were cooking in the alley. And we had to wait to get a seat. I was right by the open gas burners and was afraid of catching fire. When we did get a seat, we shared the table with two other people; there were no empty seats. They were serving only two entrees: egg something and fish. Hyon ordered us the fish. It was full of bones and we had to use our chopsticks to comb the meat off the skeleton. There were also several kinds of kimchis.
After lunch we had a ball picking out wrapping paper sold by the sheet, minimum of 10. It was about 17 cents for a nice sized sheet so we bought over a hundred sheets. We also stopped by the Alpha store and bought felt and paint and brushes.
After they dropped me off at the apartment, I used the large green sheet of felt to make a Christmas tree. But I made the cuts too long and narrow, so had to bolster the 'branches' a bit. I was disappointed with the outcome so I will try it again later.
We were invited to a barbeque by a Korean friend, so we had no idea what kind of evening we would have. First, we were late getting to the subway because of traffic. (We drove to post and parked by a gate near the subway) But we navigated the subway easily and arrived just in time. We were met and led to a small house. One other person I knew had been invited. Much food was set out and we had our fill. THEN, came the entertainment. Karaoke. Everyone was expected to participate. The Koreans, young and old, engaged eagerly. Apparently it is very popular with all generations. But we Americans were not prepared. However, in the spirit of the festivities we sang anyway. Hopefully no recordings exist.
During the course of the evening, Chris was asked to play Santa at a dapartment store on Christmas eve, and I was asked to 'teach' English to two groups of kids at some culture center on the 27th.
Karaoke ended at 10 and the party broke up immediately. We were led back to the station and even accompanied onto the subway train. The older man, Dr. Moon, showed me Korean characters on his cell phone, explaining which letters they represented. That was interesting, but I am not sure how much of it I remember. We rode several stops past theirs, then walked back to the car, and drove home. Too tired to do anything else, we went to bed.