We hadn’t been there in a while so we decided to go last Saturday evening following a trip to the nearby “Collection.”
NOTE: I would like to preface this story by admitting that neither of us was at our finest after staying up rather late the night before at a party.
At 5 pm, it was already pitch dark. The Shilla sign glowed feebly in the mist and as we approached the drive, I noted only two other cars in the lot. To make matters more sinister, my new phone (birthday present from Stavros) rang as I was setting the parking brake and its unfamiliar ring confused and startled me. There was no name associated with the number, and the voice that barked out at me could have belonged to any one of my male friends.
“How was the party!” it demanded to know.
“Albert?” I tried.
“What?”
“Albert, is this Albert?” I was very puzzled because Albert had been at the party.
“It’s GREGOR!” he shouted in annoyance. I frowned at the phone.
“Oh, well, we are about to walk into a restaurant, can I call you later?”
“I guess,” sniffed Gregor, hanging up.
Stavros was already negotiating our seating with the Japanese hostess as I was replacing my phone in my bag and I saw with horror that she was trying to lead him into the Fume Room.
“UH—NO!” I shouted. They both turned around with stunned expressions.
“May we sit in here?” I gestured calmly to the sushi half of the restaurant.
The hostess nodded demurely and Stavros pivoted and followed without missing a beat.
Apart from the sushi chefs, we were the only people in the room. Those must have been their cars out front. What are they doing taking the choice parking places? I thought bitterly. We sat down and then I immediately got back up to go wash my hands. The music was quite loud in the ladies’ room and was the sort of soft rock normally found in chain discount stores.
The waiter appeared at once and I ordered a glass of wine. Yes, I know I previously admitted to being hungover but what man among us can cast stones?
“What are you getting?” I demanded.
“The Bo-Bup Gog,” said Stavros, or something like this.
“Allright. I wonder if the udon is good here. Is the udon good here?” I said to the waiter impatiently.
He looked at me with an amused expression I took for insolence.
“Nevermind,” I said. “I’ll take the udon. Does that come with the sides? The little side dishes, the bowls of stuff? Or is that just with entrees? Can you get it with the udon? CAN YOU?!??!” I almost grabbed him by the collar.
“Yes, comes with sides,” he responded.
“Ok, that’s what I’ll have, only NO SHRIMP TEMPURA, got it? Vegetable. Can I get vegetable tempura instead?”
“Vegetable tempura, okay.”
“The Bul-Book Kon,” said Stavros, closing his menu and handing to the waiter.
I fooled around with my new phone for a few minutes and drank my wine.
“Remember when we came here that one time and you told me that story about your uncle, and the swords on the wall?” I asked my glassy-eyed mate.
“What? My uncle? What uncle?”
“Your uncle,” I said. “Something about a sword, there were swords on a wall somewhere.”
He looked baffled. The waited returned and set down six small bowls of pickled salads and gross fish cake slices. Also my udon, sans tempura anything. We started eating at once and the waiter left, then came back a moment later with Stavros’s Bul-Bik Gog, which turned out to be plain boiled beef slices with onions and one lettuce leaf.
My udon was sweet. There were bell pepper slices floating around and the broth was sick with their flavor. I added some kimchee and soy sauce and that helped somewhat.
“What about the tempura?” Stavros asked me.
“I don’t know, I’ll ask. Maybe he thought I didn’t want it at all?” I wondered aloud. “Excuse me!” I said to the waiter, who was lurking down at the end of the sushi bar and watching us.
“Um, I meant that HE will eat my shrimp tempura, not that I didn’t want it…” I lied, pointing at Stavros with my chopsticks. “We DO want that,” I added.
The waiter looked confused.
“Uh…one moment,” the waiter said, and disappeared. Ten seconds later he was back.
“Vegetable is already cooking,” he said, “Cannot change. So sorry.”
“Oh. Okay. I guess I’ll just take the vegetable, then,” I said, looking at Stavros for any further clues. Finding none, I mumbled to the waiter’s back, “Do you think we can have some more kimchee?”
He returned with more kimchee and fled without a word. We ate in silence and kept waiting for the tempura. I didn’t want to ask again. I must have misunderstood something.
A waitress stopped at our table. “Is everything okay?” she asked.
I paused. I could bring up the tempura with her, a new person. I looked at Stavros, who had long since finished his beef and onions, and said, “Do you think we could have another bowl of kimchee?”
