Posted on 07/07/2004 4:37:33 AM PDT by yonif
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - North Korean leader Kim Jong Il has introduced hamburgers to his reclusive, communist country in a campaign to provide "quality" food to university students, media reported Wednesday.
The hamburgers were introduced in 2000 and dubbed "gogigyeopbbang," Korean for "double bread with meat," according to the June 29 edition of the North Korean state-run newspaper Minju Joson. The report was carried by South Korea's Yonhap news agency on Wednesday.
Although reports from the isolated country have in recent years mentioned the introduction of the American fast food classic, the latest announcement seems to credit the country's leader for their advent.
The news marks a curious development for North Korea, where U.S. consumerism is routinely reviled in the official media and people refer to the soft drink Coca Cola as the "cesspool water of American capitalism."
Wednesday's report cites leader Kim Jong Il as saying at the time of the hamburger's introduction: "I've made up my mind to feed quality bread and french fries to university students, professors and researchers even if we are in (economic) hardship."
The government then built a hamburger plant and Kim Jong Il ordered officials to pay close attention to modernizing mass production, the report was quoted as saying by Yonhap.
Hamburgers from the factory were first provided only to students at the elite Kim Il Sung University in Pyongyang, but were later provided to other schools, the daily said.
Hamburgers are now familiar to many North Koreans, it added.
After all, what is gogigyeopbbang?
Chopped ham? No! It's chopped dissident!
But now they can get a double bread with meat.
Gosh. How many patties can you really get out of a communist cat anyhow? I mean, they're awful skinny.
I always thought it was Korean for "gastric ulcer".
" One may think it is made from the remains of those North Korean citizens the regime murders on a daily basis."
Sadly, you might be right. I read a story in the Telegraph about "special meat" sold in markets. "Special meat" is human remains. The same article mentioned that children often disappear mysteriously near restaurants and butcher shops.
I'll try to find the link and post it here.
sauerkraut: salted cabbage that is essentially pickled
kim-chee: fermented cabbage w/garlic and cayenne that is essentially rotted.
I suppose the difference is cultural. I like sauerkraut. I have attempted to like kim-chee and simply do not.
I imagine cats have been quite scarce in North Korea for some years now.
I remember being invited to dinner for mahi-mahi sushi. I told my husband before hand that if I couldn't eat it, I would be polite and we could go out for something else afterward.
I couldn't believe how good it was! Tasted like very rare beef tenderloin! Our host had purchased half a fish straight from the fisherman that afternoon. We were on vacation in the Caribbean.
I have also had fresh yellow snapper sushi prepared by a Japanese man who knew how. While not up to the mahi-mahi, IMO, it was also quite good.
Their cajun burger will most likely have real cajuns in it.
When I was serving in Korea, I lived in a quonset hut (which was at least 70 feet long). When one of our guys would go out and eat kimchee (that's the way we spelled it), he could come in one door and someone at the other end of the building could immediately smell the kimchee on his breath. So help me! It's true.
That stuff is wicked.
Hamburgers? Maybe they can stop eating grass, bark and each other now.
It's not just for breakfast anymore.
Now we've got someplace safe to dump the downer cattle & "Mad Cow" beef.
Re #12 It means, "meat double bread", that is, "double bun meat."
Definately not true. My MIL was over visiting three years ago and she whipped up a batch of kimchee. There was no fermenting involved. Just soak cabbage in salt water, mix in some red pepper paste, garlic, and whatever else you want: Presto! You've got kimchee.
It should be noticed that kimchee is really a way of preparing a food, and not always a particular food. Just like "pickle" usually refers to pickled cucumbers, but you can pickle lots of other stuff. Same with kimchee, there are lots of types of kimchee, and you haven't smelled the bad stuff until you've gotten a whiff of radish kimchee with oysters. WOW!
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