By Sho Chang-young
"Gim," also romanized as "kim," is a generic term for a group of dried seaweed sheets used in Korean cuisine. As an average Korean, I am a gim lover. Whenever my wife and I go grocery shopping, I don't miss choosing seasoned grilled gim. Sometimes, I really enjoy shopping for two sets of packed gim from the buy-one-get-one-free sale at the local supermarket.
Several days ago, a regular contributor to this column published an interesting article centered on the brief history of gim in our country. He wrote about his memories as well. With deep empathy, I would like to describe my own stories and thoughts about gim.
I also have interesting childhood memories of gim. It was then a precious kind of food that could not be easily brought to the dining table. Once in a while, my mother bought valuable gim from the market, and there used to be grilled gim on the evening menu. But its size was a bit smaller than you think.
After roasting several large sheets of gim, she cut them into smaller sheets and placed them on a big plate. After dipping the gim in sesame-oiled soy sauce, we placed those small pieces of roasted gim on top of a spoonful of hot rice and ate it. It was indeed delicious! Being able to eat "gimbap" on a school picnic was the best luxury at that time.
When I was a young man, the well-dried fine gim was sold in 100-sheet units and was very popular as a holiday gift. In my years of being a novice teacher, I worked in a small school in a fishing village where a lot of gim products were being produced. Unlike today, almost all production work was done manually. The final process was to dry the thin, wet gim in the sun, upon a straw mat. I remember the sound of it drying, which I heard whenever I passed by the drying mat. It was like the sound of raindrops starting to fall on the ground.
Along with the socio-economic development experienced by Korea, the food culture has developed greatly. Gim has also changed significantly. The production of gim has become more and more mechanized and specialized, and its quantity and quality have reached the highest level in the world today. The emergence of the packed seasoned grilled gim can be said to have been a great turning point in the history of our gim industry. Nowadays, it is no longer seen as a high-end food and has become a favorite of common folk.
Here's one thing I want to mention. How should we express gim in English? If you look at our information materials for foreigners, it is often called Seaweed, Laver or Nori, etc. Is that correct? This writer himself once had trouble telling a foreign friend what gim is in one word. Seaweed is literally "weed in the sea." Laver originally meant one breed or wet food from along the Welsh coastline. Nori is a Japanese product, which is similar to gim but not the same. Alternatively, Laver-seaweed is sometimes used, but its scope is too broad and can be misleading.
To force the unique words of one culture to be replaced with the ones of another culture can impede genuine understanding. This is the case with the word gim. From now on, when we introduce gim internationally, let us call it gim. And if you need a further explanation, why not explain it as the dried and grilled thin seaweed that covers the main ingredients of gimbap. I think there will be no foreign hallyu fans who know nothing about gimbap.
I sincerely wish that the Korean word gim becomes widely used around the world.
The writer (sochan57@naver.com) is a retired principal of Gunsan Girls' High School.
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Several days ago, a regular contributor to this column published an interesting article centered on the brief history of gim in our country. He wrote about his memories as well. With deep empathy, I would like to describe my own stories and thoughts about gim.
I also have interesting childhood memories of gim. It was then a precious kind of food that could not be easily brought to the dining table. Once in a while, my mother bought valuable gim from the market, and there used to be grilled gim on the evening menu. But its size was a bit smaller than you think.
After roasting several large sheets of gim, she cut them into smaller sheets and placed them on a big plate. After dipping the gim in sesame-oiled soy sauce, we placed those small pieces of roasted gim on top of a spoonful of hot rice and ate it. It was indeed delicious! Being able to eat "gimbap" on a school picnic was the best luxury at that time.
When I was a young man, the well-dried fine gim was sold in 100-sheet units and was very popular as a holiday gift. In my years of being a novice teacher, I worked in a small school in a fishing village where a lot of gim products were being produced. Unlike today, almost all production work was done manually. The final process was to dry the thin, wet gim in the sun, upon a straw mat. I remember the sound of it drying, which I heard whenever I passed by the drying mat. It was like the sound of raindrops starting to fall on the ground.
Along with the socio-economic development experienced by Korea, the food culture has developed greatly. Gim has also changed significantly. The production of gim has become more and more mechanized and specialized, and its quantity and quality have reached the highest level in the world today. The emergence of the packed seasoned grilled gim can be said to have been a great turning point in the history of our gim industry. Nowadays, it is no longer seen as a high-end food and has become a favorite of common folk.
Here's one thing I want to mention. How should we express gim in English? If you look at our information materials for foreigners, it is often called Seaweed, Laver or Nori, etc. Is that correct? This writer himself once had trouble telling a foreign friend what gim is in one word. Seaweed is literally "weed in the sea." Laver originally meant one breed or wet food from along the Welsh coastline. Nori is a Japanese product, which is similar to gim but not the same. Alternatively, Laver-seaweed is sometimes used, but its scope is too broad and can be misleading.
To force the unique words of one culture to be replaced with the ones of another culture can impede genuine understanding. This is the case with the word gim. From now on, when we introduce gim internationally, let us call it gim. And if you need a further explanation, why not explain it as the dried and grilled thin seaweed that covers the main ingredients of gimbap. I think there will be no foreign hallyu fans who know nothing about gimbap.
I sincerely wish that the Korean word gim becomes widely used around the world.
The writer (sochan57@naver.com) is a retired principal of Gunsan Girls' High School.
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