Learning English

Speaker 1
00:00
Thank you very much! So beautiful! Isn't that a rice cooker? Yeah! That is gigantic!

Speaker 2
00:06
- Oh boy.

Speaker 1
00:08
You don't even have to... What is this fantasy thing?

Speaker 3
00:12
So part of the boilers dries up faster.

Speaker 1
00:16
Such a fancy thing! Well, we arrived yesterday. We got lost.

Speaker 2
00:27
We got lost at the sales station, yes.

Speaker 1
00:29
Well, we had to take the line number 4 and to go from the train to that line it was very complicated but we met like a lot of really nice Koreans that helped us. Every time we looked very lost, they came to us and asked, Where do you have to go? And then they brought us to the elevators or the right line or the entrance of the metro. They were super nice. It was a really good experience to have warm people welcome us immediately. They also helped us a little bit with the suitcase. This was great. We arrived here in the city. It was extremely cold.

Speaker 2
01:09
Did you expect it to be this cold?

Speaker 1
01:11
I mean I knew that it was gonna be cold. I didn't expect this much. I am used to maybe go to the mountains in Italy and way drier so even if it's cold it doesn't feel that cold and it's easy to walk around in here. It was intense. Are you used?

Speaker 2
01:32
could happen that it hasn't been in a long while and me living in Italy I got a little bit more used to it being a mild soft winter but this is a refresher. A refresher of those kind of temperatures.

Speaker 1
01:46
If we ever go back to Hamburg during the winter, I have to expect this kind of cold.

Speaker 2
01:52
Hopefully not.

Speaker 1
01:53
We had a great experience with the guest house because the floors are heated.

Speaker 2
01:58
As the floors were heated, the lady was very nice. She sat with us for like an hour, showing us all the different food places she recommends in the area. Helped us set up the app. What is it called? Naver. Naver, yeah. Very useful. Immediately to a Korean fried chicken place.

Speaker 1
02:14
The thing that surprised us was the chicken plate was pretty cheap so we were like oh maybe we can order many things but actually they came with a huge portion that was amazing but it was a mere surprise.

Speaker 2
02:27
- Party platter.

Speaker 1
02:29
Party platter. Yeah, it was amazing.

Speaker 2
02:30
Also good quality, like really good quality. It tasted amazing.

Speaker 1
02:34
Today we're going to visit our friend of 10 years.

Speaker 2
02:37
or countryside. - It should be a little bit more spacious.

Speaker 1
02:42
Two-story building? Well, I don't know if it means bigger or it develops in height.

Speaker 2
02:47
If it's in the countryside, maybe it's a little bit more, I don't know, traditional than recent build.

Speaker 1
02:52
I don't know, I'm very excited. First Korean house that I've ever been to is the guest house we're staying in right now.

Speaker 2
02:59
which is beautiful.

Speaker 1
03:00
- Which is beautiful.

Speaker 2
03:01
She never told you?

Speaker 1
03:01
I didn't really see pictures of it

Speaker 2
03:04
All my male friends, when they build houses, that's all they do. Show pictures, talk about construction. I just renovated upstairs living room. We will see. I'm excited to see her house.

Speaker 1
03:13
And also interesting to be able to see outside of the town because that is also an experience that I'm excited to do. The capital of a country doesn't really represent how the rest of the country looks like. This way we can have like a more rounded idea of how Korea actually looks like.

Speaker 2
03:36
There it is right here.

Speaker 4
03:37
Oh my god! Hello!

Speaker 1
03:49
What should we take off our shoes? Take off your shoes up there. So we take them off here?

Speaker 5
03:54
Yes, it's actually different from regular Korean houses. Yeah. How did you guys

Speaker 1
03:59
All right.

Speaker 5
04:00
It's too cold outside.

Speaker 4
04:02
What is this, baby?

Speaker 2
04:05
It's okay.

Speaker 1
04:05
Yeah? It was okay. The German says. The Italian says it's cold as fuck. Wow. Welcome. Thank you very much.

Speaker 5
04:17
- Beautiful. - Yeah. You can see the view. The view is my favorite part.

Speaker 1
04:22
- Oh, this is great. Leo was like, Oh, this is supposed to be countryside. It doesn't look like countryside. - I know.

Speaker 2
04:30
- What is this country's side?

Speaker 5
04:33
- Outskirts, I would say.

Speaker 1
04:34
- Oh, okay.

Speaker 5
04:35
- 'Cause it's like, let me take your coat. Sorry, I'm such a bad host.

Speaker 1
04:38
Sorry.

Speaker 5
04:40
- Yes! - This is Italian chocolate.

Speaker 1
04:42
Different types of chocolate and also because it was Christmas, this is the mini one. Because the big one was too big. Thank you so much. I hope they are not melted. It has been quite some time. in any form.

Speaker 5
04:57
Thank you. How was your flight?

Speaker 1
05:00
It was perfect. Actually, this is the first time we used Korean Air. And it was a great experience because usually we travel with Ita Airways and there's no leg space. But in Korean Airways, even in the economy, there's so much space. It felt great. The food was also very good.

Speaker 5
05:18
Do you guys want some water?

Speaker 1
05:19
Yes, I would love some water. Thank you. Our kitchen is actually smaller than this one. Is it? Yes.

Speaker 5
05:25
So one thing, the filtering system, it's connected to the tap water and it filters it through. It's called jeonsugi

Speaker 1
05:33
The reason is that the normal tap water doesn't taste

Speaker 5
05:36
good. Do you want to see what the tap water tastes like? The water in Seoul is more delicious.

Speaker 2
05:41
So this is normal water.

Speaker 1
05:42
Oh yeah, yeah, I taste the difference, yes.

Speaker 2
05:45
Ooh, yeah.

Speaker 1
05:45
This is better. In Italy, it's kind of the same thing. We don't have, but usually we just buy the filtered, like,

Speaker 5
05:53
Brita.

Speaker 1
05:54
Yeah, exactly. The water everywhere, you can obviously drink it, but it's

Speaker 5
05:59
- There's also the piping system.

Speaker 1
06:00
Yeah, exactly. Isn't that a rice cooker? Yeah. That is gigantic. That's a big boy.

Speaker 5
06:04
to make sure we can feed a lot of people. I like it because it talks to me. I love that. Oh my god. Actually, I've made banana cake in here. It's very convenient. Then you can make a reservation for the next day. I see, I see. Oh, that's great. I would love that. The beautiful thing that I noticed is that the plugs are the same. The plugs are the same? Yeah. You can buy any electrical product. Do you guys use gas? Yes, not in our house because everything is electric right now. Normal houses, yes. More people use the induction stoves in Europe, right? Lately, it's way more popular because it's safer. In Germany, I've never seen gas. If you remove the pan, it turns off by itself. But this one stays on. For this one, if something happens, if it gets too hot, it starts beeping.

Speaker 5
07:01
and it will turn off it has an automatic risk management system so fancy technological thing from Korea oven also no okay so that one thing that kind of frustrates me about Korean households usually is that you don't have ovens because you know the European food is mostly cooked in ovens so this one is kind of a hybrid microwave and an oven usually the ovens they have the heated thing underneath. Yeah. This one goes just from the top. Oh, okay, okay, okay. We're just two people in this house, right? Yes. Can you guess why do we have such a big fridge? Okay, okay. I think I saw in a documentary or something like that, there's a specific kitchen.

Speaker 5
07:46
yes that's the thing this is the regular fridge it's not of course we have kimchi here yes kimchi soup is here i see it and then here is the golden oh this is huge

Speaker 1
08:03
You don't even have to... - Yeah.

Speaker 5
08:06
- Wow.

Speaker 1
08:07
- Fancy things.

Speaker 5
08:07
So we have different types of kimchi. One is like old fermented kimchi. The other one is regular kimchi. Then pa kimchi, like green onion kimchi. And then we have actually rice here as well. We store it in the fridge.

Speaker 2
08:21
How much kimchi do you eat?

Speaker 1
08:23
We eat kimchi every day. Every day? Oh yeah. Okay.

Speaker 2
08:26
I only saw the ones in the clay pots.

Speaker 5
08:29
Kkotjejang

Speaker 1
08:40
Yes, we're big fans. Actually, we found it at the supermarket in Genova. And we were so excited, we bought like four cans.

Speaker 5
08:48
When you have gochujang, you can make a lot of Korean food.

Speaker 1
08:50
- Yeah.

Speaker 2
08:50
I looked it up how to make kimchi, but the cabbage, the red cabbage first, which.

Speaker 1
08:55
Which is not as easy to find.

Speaker 5
08:57
Kimchi is the type of like the fermenting process of the food. You can make it with any type of vegetable basically because they use a lot of vegetables here. Radish kimchi is very popular. Much more easy to make. I can teach you a little bit.

Speaker 1
09:10
- Yes, yes, yes, yes.

Speaker 5
09:12
Okay, shall we move? I'm very proud of our bathroom. When we renovated the house, he did the whole design thing. Okay, okay. I'm very proud of his work. So this is our bathroom. Oh,

Speaker 1
09:25
Oh, I see, I see.

Speaker 2
09:27
- That's a fancy sink.

Speaker 1
09:29
Daddy's a very fancy singer.

Speaker 5
09:31
- Very hard to make.

Speaker 1
09:32
Yeah, I believe you.

Speaker 5
09:33
One thing that I really love about this one because usually you have to make sure it's dry after you wash. This one we have heated floors so part of the boilers dries up faster.

Speaker 1
09:48
- Such a fancy thing.

Speaker 5
09:50
It's common actually.

Speaker 1
09:52
Really? Yeah. What I noticed is... Well, in all Europe, I think Bulgaria is the same. You have like radiators to heat up the house. But in Korea, as soon as we arrived at our guest house... The floor is...

Speaker 5
10:07
- It's called ondol.

Speaker 1
10:09
- Yeah.

Speaker 5
10:09
- I've used it since back in the days like...

Speaker 1
10:12
great yeah yeah so I would love to have a bathroom with heated floors in your

Speaker 5
10:18
Europe, do you have like drainage?

Speaker 1
10:20
- No. - In the bathroom area, like where the toilet is, no. Or the sink is, no, absolutely no.

Speaker 2
10:25
- You have a wet box where the shower is.

Speaker 1
10:29
- That's right. - Yeah, and then you have the--

Speaker 2
10:32
curtain or door.

Speaker 1
10:33
Actually if it gets wet it's a problem you're like oh no, a hole somewhere that I have to close up

Speaker 5
10:39
It's easier to get the water out.

Speaker 1
10:40
clean way more properly yeah instead of just mopping you can actually go

Speaker 2
10:46
Scroll.

Speaker 6
10:47
Sorry, I saw the natural green tea Listerine.

Speaker 2
10:51
- That's a local flavor?

Speaker 1
10:53
You can try it later.

Speaker 5
10:55
Nice.

Speaker 1
10:57
That is a very fancy bathroom I have to say.

Speaker 5
11:00
Is it common in Italian houses to have air conditioning? No.

Speaker 1
11:04
It's very uncommon. It's a very recent thing. Hotels usually have it but not all the hotels. It depends how new they are because it didn't used to be that hot during the summer. At least not in the north. And now it's getting hotter and hotter so the problem is getting a little bit out of hand. A lot of people is starting to invest in air conditioning. For example, our apartment, the architect is very conscious about the environment so she didn't even think about like putting air conditioning in which made it a little bit tough for us we will see in the future

Speaker 5
11:39
That's ours. It's kind of very big because we have like a big space, right? One thing I was very surprised is that some air conditioners here, they only act as coolers because back in Europe, you will have like cooler and heater.

Speaker 1
11:50
Yes, usually you have both functions. Your hair is super dry. And I have a lot of eye problems. So I have to use a lot of eye drops. Having the heating on was killing me.

Speaker 5
12:04
When you get cold, you use the...

Speaker 7
12:06
Oh, right. You have to score.

Speaker 1
12:07
You have the floor heating. It's extreme emergency. What does it say?

Speaker 5
12:12
It's okay, we're not gonna die.

Speaker 1
12:14
Good to know.

Speaker 5
12:16
Okay. So it's basically saying that it's too cold outside and if you can avoid going outside. Don't go.

Speaker 1
12:24
Is it normal this kind of thing?

Speaker 5
12:27
In Korea? Yes. Not only just a natural disaster, but when the weather is too extreme, like too hot, too cold, they always send this type of messages.

Speaker 1
12:36
All the cell phones are receiving it because... All the cell phones.

Speaker 5
12:39
As long as you're in Korea, even if you have a foreign SIM card, you will still get it.

Speaker 1
12:45
Oh, that's so interesting.

Speaker 5
12:46
Wow! Very useful. It's useful because you never know because sometimes you can get an earthquake. We also get notifications when something happens from North Korea.

Speaker 1
12:56
Yeah. That is very true.

Speaker 5
12:58
- The other point is also for people that have dementia and they get lost. So you will, as long as you're in that area, I feel like they use the GPS of your phone. So for example, in our town, someone got lost, right? They're looking for them and they put a link and then you have their photo.

Speaker 1
13:15
If you see them, you can guide them to maybe a police officer. very useful that would be great also initially because as you problem with aging population yeah but

Speaker 7
13:25
We don't really have that.

Speaker 1
13:26
Usually you don't have alerts, you have a city website that tells you don't go out or flooding. If you go out you might die. I almost died when I was a child because it happened and they didn't close the schools. So you went to school and there was a flood? I went to school and then there was a flood. So now they are way more conscious and every time there's a red alert they decide to close all the schools. For example, knowing that the school

Speaker 5
13:52
- Schools are closed. - For you as a teacher. - Maybe as a teacher. - Oh, this goes across all the walls. - I don't have to go to work. - That's so bad. - While you're still in bed, you can just go back to sleep. - Exactly, exactly. I have a question. Is that humongous thing there your TV? - Yes, it is. - That's gigantic. The thing is that when we renovated the house, we were like, okay, we need a centerpiece. That is definitely a statement. Because we didn't want a very bulky TV, although it's like wide. It's a different material. So it's very matty. It can just look like... a drawing. That is so nice. It's connected to the weather so the it changes like the weather in the picture changes as it's outside. I don't know why it's foggy right now but when it's snowing it's snowing here. When it's raining it's raining here. That is really cute. I love it! That's fantastic! I don't know where we could put it. Our house.

Speaker 5
14:51
New house, new TV. New house, sure. What is growing in your garden? Basilicum. We have a lot of basil, chives and also you can use it for Korean barbecue because they have this thing called Sam. Okay. Oh, with green leaves? Any type of leaf. Usually it's lettuce. Yes, usually lettuce and then you put your meat, garlic and other sauces. Then you make it a wrap. Okay, nice. We have to try that. Yes. Korean barbecue. Yes, we can have that. Perfect. Okay, and this is our bedroom. It's kind of small. It's like... It's okay, I cannot touch it. For me it's perfect! It's kind of common for Korean houses to have lower ceilings. It's easier to heat them. Ah, that's smart. Makes sense.

Speaker 5
15:47
Also because the heating is coming from the floor, so it's going up and if you have

Speaker 1
15:52
Well, we have that problem in Italy a lot actually. Ceilings at that time were very high because the area was very fancy. Marble on the floor, fancy stuff on the ceiling and having high ceiling was a sign of like a very...

Speaker 5
16:08
Yeah.

Speaker 1
16:08
Exactly. The problem is that it was so cold because the heaters couldn't. Someone is not really high in the... Like, it shouldn't be that cold.

Speaker 5
16:18
The same as Europe.

Speaker 1
16:20
Yeah, kind of, right?

Speaker 5
16:21
yeah the weather should be similar but i think we are a peninsula so because of the

Speaker 1
16:27
the ocean is there like I I'm used to the Mediterranean Sea So the weather is a little bit different probably. I was talking to Leo about that, like even when you go to the mountains in Italy usually it might be very cold but actually you don't feel it because it's very dry so it doesn't really go into your bones.

Speaker 8
16:46
- Eddie, what is that?

Speaker 5
16:47
Can you guess?

Speaker 8
16:50
I mean, I guess it's to eat.

Speaker 5
16:52
Okay, you're close. Yeah? Yeah.

Speaker 8
16:54
For soup? To make something?

Speaker 5
16:58
ancestor ritual.

Speaker 1
17:00
Oh, okay.

Speaker 5
17:01
household where there's just one son like in our case he's supposed to do that and that's

Speaker 1
17:06
- Okay. - Oh, okay. - So it's to present the food, it's not actually to eat it.

Speaker 5
17:11
presented and then you do some are going to do that. I will send you a photo. It's a lot of fruits, a lot of specific food, fish, tiring process because you have to prepare from the day before, you need to buy all the certain products. So a lot of Korean people are kind of not doing it. Not everyone does it. Even in our family, like my husband was like, we don't need to do it. I like this Korean tradition, this is your history, so I'd love to do it. and it's kind of fun for me. With the help of my husband, he's a very great cook as well. Are you hungry?

Speaker 8
17:49
Yeah So where are we going?

Speaker 1
17:51
You'll see. - Oh yeah? - Yeah.

Speaker 5
17:53
Okay, let's go.