How I Met My Spouse

Koreans in general meet each other on blind dates set up through friends. In Busan, a popular first date spot is a restaurant called, and I can't make this shit up, Guess Who-- a name so appropriate, it belongs in the same category with Alexis' autograph from the famous track star, I-Perfection.

"Yah, yah, yah. We just called him Harris."

My good friend Marc recently wrote me on the topic of his upcoming blind date, in which his skepticism clearly outweighs his excitement:

"It's like going to the thrift store to find the perfect pair of underwear. Or something."

But when you ask most Korean couples how they met, they usually say it was this way: A friend set them up with someone he or she knows. Pictures were exchanged. They said nae or annio.

Which gives me an idea-- today's subject for my adult conversation class: how you met your spouse; sure to spark interesting dialogue where we branch off into different topics, filling the entire class period; all the while leaving me to plan nothing more than:

"How did you meet your spouse?"

"Blind date."

"Blind date."

"Blind date."

"Same."

Foiled again!

But now I'm curious. Searching for a more interesting story, I probe a happy expat couple I know here.

"How did you two meet in Korea?"

"We met at a bar and had sex. Same as most expats."