Talking smack in Korean

Bethie and I split up for the weekend. She headed to a mountain outside of Seoul, while I went on a hike with a few of the guys from work, including our two Korean bosses. Here in Korea there is still a pretty strong separation of genders, so it's pretty common for a bunch of guys from work to hang out and for the ladies to do their own thing as well. In the States we often see couples or mixed groups. Here, there's a lot of groups of just men or women, all usually around the same age.
So off we went, hiking up a beautiful mountain with a Buddhist Temple at the peak set as our destination. When we first started to hike, our bosses took off, almost running. All of us Americans were like "Wha?!" After about a minute I turned to Tony, an ex-wrestler (who is in awesome shape) from Minnisota and said, "I can't go like this the whole way, I'm not going to make it." He said, "me neither." At that point our bosses, Mr. Jung and Mr. Park, turned around and started laughing at us. They just wanted to mess with us. "Oh, it's on now."
At the top was a really nice Buddhist Temple with a service going. Quite interesting to watch. Lots of folks, we were told, make the hikes up the mountains on the weekends to pray or meditate for a while. These were all normal looking people along with monks. The monk's chants were projected on a loudspeaker, so it felt very serene and spiritual. That was until we found a small sign in the back. It was a label of an historical site, written in English and Korean, that said that in this spot two rocks took the shapes of the male and female genitalia and represent reproduction. So just out of view of the service going on, and with the chanting in the background, I very respectfully whispered to the guys, "Hey, you gotta come help me find some rocks that look like a penis and vagina!" The cool thing was, our Korean bosses thought it was hilarious. Here we were, 2 older Koreans and a few young white guys, wandering around the backyard of a Buddhist temple, with chanting in the background, looking for rocks that looked like genitals. When we couldn't find the female we were starting to wonder if the monks that found these rocks had been abstinent for a little too long. But finally, "Ahhhh!" I hear, which is the Korean version of "Aha." My boss had found it. We all high fived, giggled a little, and were on our way.
A little later, we found a little perch and set up to eat. Mr. Park brought out a tupperwear with some nice sandwiches, kimbap, which is like Korean Sushi, some wine, chopsticks, napkins, plastic cups, the whole setup. I said something like, "Wow Mr. Park, this is really nice. Did you make it?" Seemingly harmless, but immediatly he turned pretty red with embarrassement, and Mr. Jung burst out into uncontrolable laughter. None of the Americans understood what was really going on. Mr. Jung, in his laughter, said something to Mr. Park in Korean, and then told us "Men don't do that in Korea." He went on to tell us that men in Korea, especially from their generation, don't even go into the kitchen because "that's the women's job." Men go to work, women work at home. That's the way it is. He also told us that asking quesitons like that is how men banter with eachother. Mr. Jung thought it was so funny becuase we were surrounded by a bunch of other male hikers, and they also laughed when they heard a young white guy capping on his boss. Mr. Park said that he didn't feel disrespected, he just didn't see it coming. That's right Mr. Park. Take that.
Monday morning, as Beth and I had just arrived at school and were unloading our lunches, Mr. Park came to greet us. In broken English, "Good morning. Oh, that looks like a very nice lunch you have there Beth. Did Ryan make it for you?" He looked at me, smirked, and walked into his office.
It is so on.
-Ryan