I Eat, Therefore I Am

A loooong time ago I saw a clip of a Kdrama (I Eat, Therefore I Am aka Eating Existence) where a rather drunk and not particularly pretty girl (who actually can clean up nicely, but let's just say that she's specifically made up to not look very attractive or "normal" in this) wakes up after a one night stand. At first, she's all oh shit and is scrambling to find her clothes and get the heck out of there before she figures out that a) she's in her place and b) the dude is the prettiest boy she's ever seen. So she takes her clothes back off and gets back into bed. I must keep him!

Seriously, this boy's skin. He's one of those people that glow like Marilyn Monroe. I remember reading somewhere in an article about her a quote from a famous photographer about how one of the reasons she always looked so luminescent in photographs was because she had very fine hair along her skin and it caught the light. A halo effect, if you will. Can't find the quote now and it sounds kinda weird when I type it out, but I get it. This guy is like that. He's called Park Byeong in the show and in real life he's No Min Woo. He's a drummer and an actor and not super well known as far as I can tell in that he hasn't been in a lot of major things (the biggest of which seems to be My Girlfriend is a Gumiho and My Unfortunate Boyfriend where it looks like he plays another "too pure for this world" man) and had some kind of legal issues with his management company and (this sentence is getting really long) has been in the military for his stint for the last couple of years. And apparently likes to play quirky, odd characters. So now I love him. Because dude is hella quirky in this: he's attracted to Yang because she reminds him of an alien (like from Aliens) and he loves aliens and he waxes randomly poetic about soup. So maybe I love the writer, I dunno, though No Min Woo clearly inhabits the character. The screenwriter is credited as Ok Soo Dong Dal Pil but a preliminary Google search doesn't turn up much about him/her.

Anyway, all that is preamble to say that I watched the majority of it last night. Which sounds, like, whoa! But you have to realise that the episodes are really short (like 8 to 10 minutes) and I actually started at episode 4 or 5, which is where No Min Woo comes in. I don't think I missed anything major in the first few episodes and let's face it, I was there for No Min Woo. The girl lead by herself is a little too much; his character mellows the story. It's the spoonful of sugar theory of life.

Basically, Yoo Yang (Ahn Young Mi) is a struggling writer and she starts off in some dead end desk job but winds up fired/quits rather spectacularly by flinging raw oysters right at the face of her boss. A very stick it to the man kinda thing. She's got some anger management issues and is generally a rather bizarre person. Oh, I get it. She's abrasive but needy and seethes with righteous indignation but is also funny and sympathetic. She's the kind of person I like to write or watch but who would probably drive me batshit crazy in real life. Or maybe not. Maybe I'm her. On the inside.

Not a lot happens in the drama -- I mean, it's super short -- but the two leads do fall in love. They have a breakup though when he proposes marriage to her (he's quirky, but a traditionalist, I guess and is all-in) and she reacts by going on a self-absorbed rant about how she doesn't believe in marriage or kids or any of that stuff and isn't existential loneliness better than kowtowing to expectations? They get back together in somewhat dramatic fashion (on his part) when he's on a company outing (he designs mobile games) and saves an octopus from the hot pot and runs to her while carrying the sloshing carafe full of water, hope, and octopus. Coincidentally, she'd also just decided to call him and his phone rings as he reaches her door.

There's another bit where she gains some humanity and insight when the mom of the kid that she tutors dies and she realises that her old boss is the kid's dad and he's not an evil person after all and has his own life and dreams. And there's a plot thread about her best friend being pregnant and marrying a guy who's been cheating on her. And...that's basically it. The show wraps a year later wherein the best friend has had twins and has the husband's family wrapped around her finger, Park Byeong is still with Yang and has been promoted at his job and is doing alien stuff. And life goes on.

The underlying thread that runs all through this story of modern day angst is food and the comfort of it. The little joys. That's actually the thing that brought Park and Yang together -- a shared love and joy in eating. There's lovely bits when he's cheering her up with a hot pot and comparing her to the soup and strange bits when Yang goes off on her friend's fiancé over a steak. The best friends enjoying some perfect sweet & sour chicken together, made with love by the friend's mom. The food Yang enjoyed from the student's mom that brings tears to her eyes at the funeral as she remembers it.

This is apparently what she normally looks like.

Anyway, I enjoyed it. I may even go back and watch the bits I skipped, though I don't feel like I need to as it was the lead-in stuff and I've seen clips of bits of it. It's not a perfect little story and there's not enough of it (I think it is based on a web toon?) but it did leave me wanting more. And I really want to see No Min Woo again and also Ahn Young Mi (she's in Mama Fairy and the Woodcutter and Reply 1997) as they both seem quirky as all heck.