Friday, the Follow-Up

Friday evening, we met up with some friends from our ward, the only other couple who don't have children. We went to a very traditional Korean restaurant near their home. It was the first time I've had to take off my shoes when entering a restaurant and to sit on the floor (though there were chairs without legs to sit on). All and all it was an interesting experience but not one that my poor cramped legs want to participate in again anytime soon. It looks fun, but it is very difficult to stand up when you've been sitting like that for a long period of time. The food, however, was very good. We tried two different dishes which were prepared right at our table. Again, I wish I had brought my camera with me to document the sheer number of plates and bowls that crowded our table and represent a typical Korean meal. One thing that I love about Korean meals is that if you order bulgogi for instance, you receive not only your main dish (and generally rice) but vegetables, kimchi, and other odd specialities of the house. It's always an adventure and you will also get something new everytime. And even though you receive all this food, it never weighs you down and over-stuffs you like American food does. I've already lost a few pounds from eating Korean food and walking everywhere, but now that I have my kitchen supplies, that may rapidly change. (I already baked some chocolate chip cookies. And ate WAY too many of them.)

So, we ate this elaborate meal, which was topped off by watermelon (which is insanely expensive here but very delightful) and then went to the IPark mall to see Harry Potter. We walked to the mall, about a 20 minute walk from our friends' place, and it took us some time to figure out how to even get to the theater since the mall was closing down and certain access points were closed. I keep hearing how shopping in Korea is really amazing and if the size of this mall was any indication, then Koreans certainly do like to shop. (Although I have yet to see a single shoe large enough to fit my feet.)

In Korean theaters, you have assigned seating, which means that when you purchase your ticket, you also select where you'd like to sit. In some ways this is nice--you are guaranteed a good seat and you can see online how many seats are available at each given showing of a movie. The unnice thing about this arrangement is that as foreigners, we cannot purchase our tickets online. In order to do pretty much anything in Korea you need to have their version of a social security number and since we are not Korean nationals, we can't register for simple services like buying theater tickets online. Because we wanted to have good seats, we had to go to the theater and then wait for an extra hour until the 11:30pm showing. Had the mall been open, that would have been a fun diversion, but instead we found a small mini-mart where we bought ice cream and sat and talked until we could take our seats.

The theater itself wasn't anything spectacular and the screen almost seemed too small for the size of the room. They played about 20 minutes of commercials (all in Korean) and no previews and then the movie started. It was in English, with Korean subtitles. My favorite thing about the whole endeavor was that while David and I were laughing quite uproariously at certain parts of the movie, the Koreans just didn't get it. It was dead silent except for us, and the other few English-speakers in the crowd. David did say that the subtitles didn't often do the dialogue justice, but I still found it funny that the Koreans around us just didn't get how humorous parts of the movie were.

As for the movie itself: I have to admit that I was a bit disappointed. Perhaps the extra wait time and suspension had led me to have undue expectations for the movie, but it was not up to the standards of the last movie, which was my favorite. However, the brunt of my disappointment came from the script and the absence of what I felt were integral plot points. I thought the acting was very good (the three leads continue to get better and better; I think that Emma Watson is the best of the bunch), the direction was affecting (I love David Yates work on the movies), and certain moments were absolutely delightful and heart-felt.

My main quibbles were the handling of Ginny and Harry's budding romance, the explanation of the Horcuxes, and the addition of a scene at the Burrow that was not in the book, which bothered me even more greatly due to the fact that they entirely cut out the battle at Hogwarts at the end of the book. However, I still plan on seeing the movie again when it comes to the base movie theaters this weekend. I hope a second viewing will change my opinion. I still enjoyed the movie, but obviously, I'm a bit of a Harry Potter nerd.