All language subtitles for Street.Food.S01E06.720p.NF.WEB-DL.DDP5.1.H.264-BdC

Koreans usually
do not share their feelings openly.

We just keep our negative emotions deep
in ourselves

where they stay internalized
like a part of our hearts.

We call that "han."

I feel han a lot at the market.

I've endured this han

because I have to provide for my family.

I'll do whatever it takes

for the next generation
to have a better life.

That's the Korean way.

For foreigners,

Seoul is just the capital of Korea.

But for Koreans,

Seoul is a rapidly changing city
that's losing its traditions.

Korean society was very traditional

and it was not open
to foreign countries until 1883.

But various foreign cultures started
to enter Korea in the 1900s,

and they deeply influenced the lives
of Koreans up to this day.

There is a culture clash in Korea.

There are coffee shops on every corner.

Some places people will do
brand new types of street food

and other places, old favorites.

Gwangjang Market is one of the best places

for traditional Korean food
in the country.

It's a chaotic paradise of food.

You have steam going everywhere

and people passing
and yelling at you to sit down.

People come to Gwangjang Market
because they know

that they can get real Korean food,

for example, soy marinated crabs.

Tteok-bokki
which is spicy rice cake meals.

Mayak Kimbap which are rice rolls.

Mung bean pancakes.

The kimchi dumplings, pork dumplings,

and kalguksu or knife-cut noodles.

Within Gwangjang Market,

you can find the bubble
at Cho Yoonsun's stall.

When you go there,
you feel like you're part of her family.

It's fun.

Her knife-cut noodles
are the best ones in the market.

Her broth has a richness to it,

and she serves it
with absolutely sublime kimchi.

Would you like some more noodles, ma'am?

You can have more.

Are you full?

She has spent
over a decade perfecting her dish,

staking in a very ordinary sort of dish
and elevating it.

Her food tastes like home.

I was so naive
before I started working at the market.

But the market changed me.

The challenges I experienced there

really thickened my skin.

- These are 3,000 won each?
- Yes. 3,000 won.

Cucumbers are not very fresh these days.

Ah, right.

If you are a vendor
in Gwangjang Market,

it's like a jungle.

The competition is fierce,

working there is a ruling marathon.

In the winter, it's freezing cold

and you're washing dishes
with water that should be ice.

In summer, it's so hot, you're constantly
sweating through every layer of clothes.

Ma'am, I need some ground meat.

I'll take beef.

- Yes.
- You said beef, right?

It's like every day
is a battle, but I'm always ready.

Thank you. Sure. Thanks.

In Korea, we don't complain about work.

No matter how tired I am,
I always show up to cook.

In the end, it's worth it every time
I see customers enjoying my food.

Seoul is a city that has been
through upheavals throughout its history.

The Korean War occurred in June 1950,

and went on for four years.

A lot of facilities in the nation
were destroyed by the war.

There were no victors.

Many women were widowed,

so they had to sell food on the street
to make a living.

My grandmother
started this stall in 1952,

and I've been running it up to this day.

Would you like to try this?

Many years ago,

Korea was going through a rough time
because of the war.

The priority was to find food to eat.

There were no refrigerators,

so many foods were preserved in salt
and stored away.

Since people still enjoy them,
we sell these pickled side dishes.

But now, the main sellers

are spicy raw crabs
and soy-marinated crabs.

When we first get the crab,
cleaning it is the important thing.

We boil and cool the sauce
in a traditional way,

one day in advance.

Then we put the clean crabs in a barrel
and pour the sauce in.

The boiling and pouring process
is repeated three times.

- Um, how much is it for one crab?
- It's 20,000 won.

- I'll take one, please.
- Sure.

How do you know
if there are eggs in there?

You can tell it by the shape.

The round ones are females.

This one has eggs?

The ones we marinate in soy sauce
all have eggs.

- Yes.
- Yes.

Mm.

Soy marinated crab
is a buttery, salty flavor bomb

that just explodes in your mouth.

It's like ceviche, but with soy sauce.

It's tough work...

but I can handle it.

I was born in Seoul
after the war.

When I was a child, we were very poor.

There wasn't enough food,

so everything was divided evenly
amongst everyone.

The United States provided
South Korea with flour as aid.

My mother would receive rations of flour

and use it to make knife-cut noodles.

I often watched my mother cook.

And I really enjoyed it.

That's when I discovered
my love for flour.

When I touched and kneaded the flour,

I really liked the feel of it.

It felt like a baby's bottom.

The flour was so soft and delicate.

It just felt so nice.

The making of kimchi and knife-cut noodles

got passed down
from mothers to their children.

My mother taught me
how to cook Korean dishes.

And I'm very grateful for that.

In the 1970s,

Koreans needed a way to improve
their quality of life after the war.

So the New Village Movement began

as a nationwide effort
to rebuild the country.

The Korean people worked really hard

so that their children
wouldn't have to go through

the same hardships that they went through.

That's when women came out to work,

and started selling home-cooked meals,
like mung bean pancakes.

Bindae-tteok
is a mung bean pancake.

They are made with mung beans
that are soaked overnight,

and it's always made
using a special stone grinder

because you have to get
the beans fine enough,

in order to fry them up in the oil.

As far as I know, mung bean pancakes

have been a common and popular food.

It's a classic in Gwangjang Market.

My grandmother and mother
used to run this stall.

Now, I run it with my mother.

The mung bean pancake business
is really hard.

I've been working at the market
for about 40 years.

Ever since we started the business,
I've experienced a lot of hardships.

I slept only three or four hours a night
for the first two years.

Now eat a piece of onion.

See, this guy knows how to eat.
He's eating onions with it.

You can put that down there.

Four years ago,
I was working at a research laboratory.

There were taxes and other issues
with the business

that my parents were struggling with,

so I decided to work here and help out.

I always wanted to expand the business,

so I opened two new stores.

For these stalls

to last 100 years or more,

it's important that they are passed down

through generations.

Komi, Coco, see you later.

- Give mommy a kiss.
- Kiss.

Give mommy a kiss.

Mommy will be back later.

I'll be back later.

- Have a good day.
- Thanks.

Mommy will be back later.

Bye.

While my two kids
were growing up, I was a stay-at-home mom.

But 11 years ago, everything changed.

My husband got into a lot of debt
while running his own business.

For ten years, he drained our savings.

Every time our phone rang late at night,
my husband was always terribly frightened.

It was almost always the debt collectors

calling to threaten us.

This kind of thing happened frequently.

We couldn't live a normal life anymore.

Hurry up and get started.

The water isn't boiling yet, is it?

It's boiling.

People who have never been in debt
don't know how scary it is.

We were about to lose
our house, so I was in despair.

That's when I thought I needed
to earn money.

At that time, my in-laws
were working at Gwangjang Market.

So they arranged for me
to open a stall there.

I had no other choice back then.

It's hot, so use a small plate.

Hello.

When I started working at the market,

I took over a stall

that sells blood sausage.

Even though I really hated
the smell of blood sausage,

I had to spend an entire day selling it.

It was the only way
I could keep the regular customers.

Things just got worse from there.

Come on over, ma'am.

Koreans talk
about three kinds of jealousy.

One being jealousy among shopkeepers.

I realized how terrifying
this jealousy was

when I started working at the market.

Sir, it's really cool back here.

It's cool back here.

It's the coolest spot.

Cold bean noodles, hand-cut noodles.
Come on over.

Delicious cold bean noodles. Come on over.

One time,
when I got to work in the morning,

I found garbage left in front of my stall.

Then the other vendors started yelling,

"The market is dirty because of you."

I couldn't believe it.

They just couldn't handle
the idea of a new vendor.

I had never heard
so many curse words directed at me.

I was so shocked,
and I often cried because of it.

But I had customers and people walking by.

I couldn't show them that I was crying.

So, I pretended to get something
from the fridge

and dabbed my eyes.

I felt han every day at the market.

With modernization and globalization,

the vendors in South Korea
are constantly trying to innovate

because there is so much competition.

And so what they might to do
is tweak a familiar sort of food.

I sell a baked rice dish
called baffle.

It's a mixture of Korean food ingredients
that can be served as a meal.

The baffle is made
of rice baked in a hot pan

topped with an egg, cabbage,
bacon or shrimp,

then a milk sauce, a brown sauce,
a chili sauce,

and topped with little fish flakes.

It's kind of like a really messed up
English muffin with egg.

At my old job, I was so busy
that I didn't have time to order lunch.

So, I tried frying leftover rice
in a waffle maker,

which led to my inventions of the baffle.

It is fusion food
for the young generation.

Innovative foods are becoming
the new face of Korean street food.

I want the baffle to be known
as a staple of Korean food.

Life at the market was horrible.

When I got there in the morning,
I would feel a pressure on my chest,

and I would think,
"I hope nothing bad happens today."

I wanted to give up so many times,

but there was only one reason
I couldn't...

to save my family.

Then I thought,

"Maybe I can succeed
if I do something I enjoy."

I realized that the best way
to help my family

would be to cook what I love most.

So, I decided to start selling
knife-cut noodles.

The kind my mom made for me
when I was a kid.

Then, I started adding shrimp to my broth

because I knew it would add
a sweet flavor.

When I added carrots and chives
as a garnish,

the other vendors said,
"Don't do it. Don't do that."

But I didn't care. I did it my way.

When I switched to selling noodles,
more customers started coming to my stall.

I got so busy

that I had to start hiring employees.

Do you want both meat and kimchi dumplings
on your hand-cut noodles?

Yes.

And one by one,
I started paying off our debts.

When I paid off the last one,

I shouted, "It's over, it's okay now.

There's nothing left to pay for,
and we're okay!"

The relief just spilled out of my mouth.

For the first time,
I felt in charge of my own life.

It's much harder to find
the old traditional food in Korea

because people don't want to put in
the time or effort into making it.

The only place
you can find these foods

are the traditional markets
like Gwangjang Market.

In the past, selling street foods

was one of the ways to make a living.

But these days, it has become the place
where people experiment with new ideas.

I want the baffle to be known
as new Korean street food.

The future is bright
for Korean street foods.

As our business grew
and we opened more locations,

we hired more employees.

For my parents and grandparents,

this place was their life.

To me, this a place
that I want to protect.

I'm following my grandmother's footsteps,

I failed a lot at first,

but good stories always start
with failure.

Koreans have a saying
that you get knocked down

for seven times, you get up eight.

You never give up.

You never call it a day,

and Cho Yoonsun is the perfect example.

I've endured those 11 years,

paying off our debts,

and now, my family is secure.

I supported my kids through college,

and my younger son
even went to a culinary school.

My husband and I are still together,

and he thinks of me as his savior.

Now I have many regular customers,

and I feel like they're my family, too.

Oh.

This is my spot.

I handle ducks

and BBQ here.

As you can see,
the chef stir-fries over there.

I always wanted to see.

- You did?
- Yes.

It's good to have a chance
to show you around.

Hello. Nice to meet you.

He's very good with the wok.

Impressive.

I've never seen anyone work
as hard as my mother.

Like a giving tree,
she provided everything for us kids.

Handling the wok must be difficult, right?

- It is difficult.
- Ah.

It's heavy
and it's also hot in there.

The wok gets hot, too.

I work at a Chinese restaurant
in the Four Seasons Hotel.

I considered working at the market before,

but I didn't think I would be able to cope

with the harsh environment there.

That's why.

When I think of my mother,

I reaffirm my resolution
that I must succeed.

She is an extraordinary mother

who overcame tremendous challenges.

Vendors continue
to be territorial,

but it doesn't bother me anymore.

I feel fortunate that the market

made me more thick-skinned.

It gave me strength,

and enabled me to provide a roof
for my family.

When I realized my kids
wouldn't have to struggle with debts,

I was over the rainbow.

And I'll make sure it won't happen again.

Subtitle translation by Wayne Yoo