Let me help you!

Judy here. As always I focus on stuff that you don't see in American culture when watching Korean shows. In particular I want to point out that at no point in my 70 plus years have I ever seen a man feed another man a morsel of food at a restaurant. I predict that most Americans would find this cringe-worthy.

Not so Koreans. In a recent reality show I noticed that one adult male carefully picked up food with his chopsticks and fed it to his table mate... who enthusiastically accepted the bite of food into his mouth. There was no embarrassment or hesitancy... they simply were sharing food in a normal, Korean manner.

That's Chris Cho feeding his friend. I follow Chris on Facebook for cooking tips that I will never use.

Likewise it is very common for a man to cut a woman's food into pieces. I would probably be offended and shocked if a man did that for me. What? You think I'm incapable of cutting my own food? Sexist jerk!

Less offensive to me is the habit of one person tenderly placing a choice morsel on top of a tablemate's bowl of rice. This is commonly seen and is an example of caring and affection. I find this less shocking since it's done woman to man, parent to child, etc. Kind of like 'here, try this piece of food... it's delicious & I want you to have it.'  It's also incredibly common for a diner to wrap food up in a large lettuce leaf and then place that huge bite into their friend's mouth; everyone does this in Korea!

What I also find interesting is that I don't really mind this 'feeding others' or 'caring for others' after watching so many Kdramas. It's becoming normal behavior for me and I'm wondering why my friends aren't tenderly offering me bites with their forks when we go out to restaurants.

This could be my friends tenderly trying to feed me.... or not.

Since you’ll be here in a week or so, I’d be happy to feed you. Get ready. ~ Pat