Saturday, November 13, 2010

yonki goho

We had a bizarre experience this evening.  We were able to go on a date (yay for Thai food!) and were nearly home, but not in our housing village yet.  We stopped and proceeded to park on the side of the road (just as many other cars were parked) so we could buy some fruit from a peddler, when a crazy woman with a shaved head and strange clothes started yelling at us.  At first we thought she was speaking Korean, and had no clue what she was saying.  She said the same phrase over and over, something like "yonki goho".  She said it so many times we finally realized she was saying "young kid, go home".  She was definitely targeting us.  At first we thought maybe she didn't want us parking there, perhaps because she owned the business where we were parking, but that clearly wasn't the case.  She was just a freak with a portable CD player.  She was right outside the passenger side of the van, where I was planning to get out and walk up the street to do business with the fruit guy, but I wasn't about to get out right in her face so she could attack me or whatever she was up to.  With G20 here this week we've been warned continually about violent protesters and such.  Dean figures she must be a communist left over from that.  We proceeded to park in an alley up the street, closer to the fruit vendor.  She followed us and continued yelling, always the same phrase.  Everyone else on the street ignored her.  We waved at her several times, then as we were leaving, snapped a picture of her.  She seemed to like that, and posed a bit.  I don't know if that is a Korean gesture of ill will, or if she thought she was flipping us off.  The picture was through the windshield and turned out horribly - oh well.  The whole episode was WEIRD!!!

4 comments:

lmerrill said...

Was she saying, "Yankee, go home."

Living Lavallee said...

Yes, Dean said today that he is pretty sure she was saying "Yankee, go home." She must have said it hundreds of times, or yelled it, rather.

The Merrills said...

I'm glad they're so friendly in Korea.

Living Lavallee said...

Most people are perfectly friendly - but there are commi freaks just about everywhere, unfortunately.