Intersection of Korea and the US (Shop Smart, Shop H Mart)

Alton and Jamboree.

I love my business trips to California.  It is nice to get out of Ohio and see a different surrounding.  In addition to the rare case when i get to set my favorite medical doctor friend, the parts i love are the atrociously nice weather (it was 70 degrees and sunny while Ohio was 30 degrees and snowy) and the diversity.  I love finding random restaurants with different cuisine.  I once took my coworkers to this Jamaican place.  The windows were decorated with bars and you had to walk around the block to the bathroom.  "Where did you take us?" was the common question upon arrival.  But the jerk chicken was out of sight!

Back A Yard Grill 

This time in Santa Ana (Orange County) we stumbled upon a mostly Asian shopping corner strip mall at Alton and Jamboree.  The place is anchored with an H-Mart, which i learned only a couple months back is a Korean grocery store native to the US.  They have locations all over the US.  My coworkers and i wandered through the store.  The fruit was ridiculously cheap.  One coworker who is of Middle Eastern descent commented how dessert was always fruit when he grew up.  It would be nice to have that as a part of my culture.  But really, when you have these....

Schmidt's cream puffs

or this...?

Jeni's Ice Cream

So what did i buy?  My favorite Korean snack, which is so hard to find.  찰떡파이(chal dduk pie) is like a chocopie but with glutinous rice, like 떡 (dduk).

찰떡파이!

And i found some liquors!  I like this guys, but i bought it mostly because it reminded me of the first real meal i had in New York after the girlfriend moved there.  It was a K-town Korean barbeque extravaganza.  Meat everywhere.  So good.  A great send off to Korean barbeque for the GF, who has since dropped meat from her diet. 

벡세주, a delicious twist on the normal 소주(soju)

We ate twice at the center.  Once was a mediocre Buffalo Wings place.  The other was a pan-Asian joint that was good. I was eyeing the Korean tofu joint that is open 24 hours.  Spicy tofu soup, now that would be good if you had a few drinks too many.  

While we were sitting at the wing joint, we were being served by a young Asian girl.  She came over and took our order.  She stepped a couple feet over to help the next table.  As she did, one coworker commented, "Well she speaks pretty good American doesn't she?" .......  There are so many things happening in that one question that it completely blows my mind.  Mind: exploded.  Ever seen the movie Pi?

Pi: Brain and Drill not like Strawberry and Chocolate