Table for one, p.1
Table for One, page 1
TABLE for ONE
WEATHERHEAD BOOKS ON ASIA
Weatherhead Books On Asia
Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University
Literature
David Der-wei Wang, Editor
Ch’oe Myongik, Patterns of the Heart and Other Stories, translated by Janet Poole (2024)
Vasily Eroshenko, The Narrow Cage and Other Modern Fairy Tales, translated by Adam Kuplowsky (2023)
Dung Kai-cheung, A Catalog of Such Stuff as Dreams Are Made On, translated by Bonnie S. McDougall and Anders Hansson (2022)
Jun’ichirō Tanizaki, Longing and Other Stories, translated by Anthony H. Chambers and Paul McCarthy (2022)
Endō Shūsaku, Sachiko: A Novel, translated by Van Gessel (2020)
Paek Nam-nyong, Friend: A Novel from North Korea, translated by Immanuel Kim (2020)
Wang Anyi, Fu Ping: A Novel, translated by Howard Goldblatt (2019)
Kimura Yūsuke, Sacred Cesium Ground and Isa’s Deluge: Two Novellas of Japan’s 3/11 Disaster, translated by Doug Slaymaker (2019)
Tsering Döndrup, The Handsome Monk and Other Stories, translated by Christopher Peacock (2019)
History, Society, and Culture
Carol Gluck, Editor
Yoshiaki Yoshimi, Grassroots Fascism: The War Experience of the Japanese People, translated by Ethan Mark (2015)
The Birth of Chinese Feminism: Essential Texts in Transnational Theory, edited by Lydia H. Liu, Rebecca E. Karl, and Dorothy Ko (2013)
Kojin Karatani, History and Repetition, edited by Seiji M. Lippit (2012)
Natsume Sōseki, Theory of Literature and Other Critical Writings, edited and translated by Michael Bourdaghs, Atsuko Ueda, and Joseph A. Murphy (2009)
For a complete list of books in the series, please see the Columbia University Press website.
TABLE for ONE
STORIES
YUN KO-EUN
TRANSLATED BY LIZZIE BUEHLER
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS NEW YORK
Columbia University Press wishes to express its appreciation for assistance given by the Pushkin Fund in the publication of this book.
This publication has been supported by the Richard W. Weatherhead Publication Fund of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University.
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS
Publishers Since 1893
New York Chichester, West Sussex
cup.columbia.edu
Copyright © 2024 Columbia University Press
All rights reserved
E-ISBN 978-0-231-54962-2
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Yun, Ko-ŭn, 1980– author. | Buehler, Lizzie, translator.
Title: Table for one : stories / Ko-eun Yun ; translated by Lizzie Buehler.
Other titles: 1-inyong sikt’ak. English
Description: New York : Columbia University Press, 2024. | Series: Weatherhead books on Asia
Identifiers: LCCN 2023042657 (print) | LCCN 2023042658 (ebook) | ISBN 9780231192026 (hardback) | ISBN 9780231192033 (trade paperback)
Subjects: LCSH: Yun, Ko-ŭn, 1980–—Translations into English. | LCGFT: Short stories.
Classification: LCC PL994.96.K65 A61213 2024 (print) | LCC PL994.96.K65 (ebook) | DDC 895.73/5—dc23/eng/20231017
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023042657
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023042658
A Columbia University Press E-book.
CUP would be pleased to hear about your reading experience with this e-book at cup-ebook@columbia.edu.
Book and cover design: Chang Jae Lee
Cover image: Mr. Zebra © Choi Dahye
CONTENTS
1. Table for One
2. Sweet Escape
3. Invader Graphic
4. Hyeonmong Park’s Hall of Dreams
5. Roadkill
6. Time Capsule 1994
7. Iceland
8. Piercing
9. Don’t Cry, Hongdo
1. TABLE FOR ONE
The customer comes in alone. The owner is a bit slow-witted and asks, “How many in your party tonight?” This is a family-style barbecue restaurant, though, so you can’t really say she’s slow-witted. Two servings of pork belly, a bowl of rice, a bottle of soju. Nothing too unusual, but for the order of a woman who came in alone at 7:00 p.m., it is sort of strange.
The woman drinks half a glass of soju for every three pork wraps, using both hands to have a quiet meal. Flipping meat with tongs, cutting it with scissors, grabbing it with chopsticks, putting it in her mouth with her hands—a typical way to eat. Even so, she feels uncomfortable, trapped by the gazes of those around her. The table, covered with one set of silverware, is like a boxing ring. The woman sits alone and faces the fluttering stares. The curious spectators throw a left hook, a right hook—the woman’s only way to defend herself is steadfast eating. Sometimes, she too takes aim. In the empty spaces of the barbecue joint, gazes collide and then disappear like smoke.
The meat hardens into charcoal on the hot grill. At the rate the woman is eating, she won’t be able to finish her food.
More than half the order of the woman who came alone at 7:00 p.m. remains on the table. She probably asked for one extra serving of pork so that she could eat the first. At a barbecue restaurant selling only servings of two or more, one portion of the woman’s meat is left to turn into charcoal. At 7:30, her meal ends.
Did she really have to have meat? Some might ask that. For a solitary dinner of pork belly at 7:00 p.m., it would have been easier to stop by a butcher on the way home from work than a bustling barbecue restaurant. But the woman has her reasons. Just as I, staring at her, have my reasons.
Staring at the woman is as embarrassing as eating pork wraps alone, but avoiding eye contact with her during the thirty minutes of mealtime is hard. If the woman lifts her soju glass, I lift mine; if the woman fiddles with her napkin, I do as well. And if the woman lifts her gaze and looks straight ahead, I have no option but to do so, too—because I’m staring at a wall as I sit, and on the wall hangs a large mirror. The only thing I can do to avoid her is to keep from staring at the mirror too long.
If not for a flyer I’d chanced to discover, the restaurant would not have become my chosen venue for practice and study. At two hundred thousand won for three months, I could have joined a gym, learned yoga, or bought expensive health products like red ginseng extract and gamma linoleic acid, but I chose to invest in a more pressing need. I enrolled in a course to learn how to eat alone. If I could develop a healthy stomach and an open-minded spirit in three months, like the flyer had said, wouldn’t that be the most efficient way to spend my money?
Before enrolling, I had to pass a physical examination. It wasn’t a detailed exam, just a consultant measuring my pulse and blood pressure and looking at my pupils and tongue to determine if I could immediately enter the class. After a basic conversation about my health—consisting of questions about instances of poor digestion, what and where I’d been eating when that happened, what I usually did about it, whether or not I exercised regularly—the consultant jotted something down on a piece of paper. The handwriting was difficult to read, like a doctor’s.
“Hmm, okay, okay,” the consultant said. “Cases like yours, Inyeong, are very common. It seems like you have a slight case of nervous indigestion, but that’s not a major problem. We do this check as a sort of precaution. There’s no need to push yourself, you know.”
The consultant said that he had always had indigestion from eating too quickly when he ate alone, but after he’d graduated from the course himself, the issue had gone away.
“If you’re curious about the structure of the course, it’s divided into steps,” he explained. “First there’s a written test, but it’s just common sense—you’ll pass without a problem. To give you a heads-up, solving practice exam problems will help you prepare better than memorizing information. After the written test, there’s twenty hours of skills testing—this consists of five steps—and after that, if you pass a ten-hour practical exam, then you’ll receive a certificate of completion. Usually 15 percent of students pass the first time.”
“Fifteen percent? That seems awfully low …”
The consultant smiled widely upon hearing my words. At the end of his mouthful of straight teeth, a lone gold tooth shone like a star.
“Of the 85 percent who fail, more than half sign up again. Surprising, isn’t it? But that’s typically how it goes. The course has the appeal of a triathlon. To explain a bit more clearly, I haven’t seen anyone disappointed about wasting their money, even if they don’t pass the first time. Even if they don’t pass on the first go, they can feel in their bones how their lives have changed. There are even a lot of parents who’ve heard about this place from word of mouth and decided to send their children here. It’s because the kids’ personalities are improved. Generally speaking, it happens to all of them. Let’s see, how many months should I sign you up for? If you pay with cash, we’ll give you a 10 percent discount. Yes, yes. Okay, now, if you could just fill out this form on the back of the information card. See this one line about your resolutions? Eating alone is _____. If you could just fill in the blank space.”
Eating alone is tiresome.
I thought of the descriptor quickly, but it really was the best-fitting word for the sentence. Eating alone is the most tiresome thing. No, maybe even frightening. To be clear, it wasn’t eating alone so much as going into a restaurant alone.
My coworkers all disappeared at lunchtime. They flocked together somewhere, leaving that one remaining person no option other than to pop into restaurants on their own. I was that person, and I’d already spent the past nine months like this, five days a week.
It wasn’t like this at first. The first few days after joining the company, I’d gone to nearby restaurants with my coworkers for lunch. However, barely a week passed before I was separated from the rest. As soon as it was lunchtime, all the workers swarmed together and left. I, too, hurried to organize my space and get up from my chair, but no one waited for me. The next day was the same, and the day after, too. It seemed that the reason for my exclusion wasn’t simply that I was too slow.
The first day I was excluded, I went to KFC and ordered two chicken tenders, a Zinger burger, and a diet soda, eating everything in thirty minutes. It wasn’t too awkward. I wasn’t so timid that I couldn’t eat a hamburger alone, and besides, my mind was too busy for me to feel awkward. As I chewed my Zinger burger, I wondered why in the world I had been left out. Was it really a problem that I’d gotten up from my seat one or two minutes late? The same thing happened the next day, despite the fact that I’d gotten ready early. The others rose from their seats leisurely, or went to the bathroom. After hesitating for a bit, the most natural thing I could do was press the elevator button to leave. I went to Dunkin’ Donuts as if I were running away. There, I filled my stomach with a cup of coffee and two donuts. As I took my first bite of donut and first sip of coffee, potential reasons appeared like the word of God. Was the issue that I hadn’t been friendly enough to my colleagues? Should I have gone up to them and suggested, “Let’s go eat?” I thought about my coworkers, but I couldn’t come up with an answer. There wasn’t really anyone more friendly or less friendly than me. After I swallowed one of the flavorless donuts, I realized that tomorrow I’d have to find something else to eat. Paris Croissant and Starbucks had menus that would fill my stomach, but I couldn’t spend months continuing this way.
At some point, my lunch menu moved on to kimbap, ramen, and noodles, and eventually I was able to eat a proper restaurant meal of kimchi soup with rice, surrounded by other office workers. Kimchi soup soon expanded to bean paste soup and beef stew and chicken soup with ginseng. However, because there was a limit to my movement and menu choices during the lunch hour, I mostly circled between the same restaurants. When I went back to KFC, I realized that eating alone the past week had been a mistake. I’d clearly taken the wrong path. Had I been too social with someone my coworkers avoided—maybe the manager? Or the department head? Someone else? Could that have caused this disaster? Anyhow, thinking there was a specific reason for my exclusion was much preferable to realizing that there wasn’t.
Lunch hour always ended with time to spare. From ordering my food to paying the check, I was finished in twenty minutes, thirty at most. Throughout the entire meal, I had only one thought in my mind. Was there a predetermined amount of time that one had to eat alone in their lifetime? If so, I was fast filling my quota.
Those times when I couldn’t wait a full hour and went back to the office ten or fifteen minutes early, I returned to my cozy seat, shadowed by three partitions. Before I could even digest my lunch, the regrets would pile up. Why didn’t I just eat a kimbap here? I’d tried that, of course, but lasted only about four days.
When I went to lunch alone, I avoided restaurants within a five-hundred-meter radius of the office. As my feet took me far, far away, my eyes scanned the windows of the restaurants I passed. I looked for restaurants with people eating by themselves, or devoid of customers entirely, walking, looking, walking, looking, until I found the winning place. I considered the cuisine only after going in. People eating alone worry more about stares from others than they do about menu options.
Searching for a restaurant near my office with few or no customers was like trying to buy a house on a low budget. Like homes that are affordable but lack charm, quiet restaurants on a road busy with office workers served terrible food. After I moved my class time to my lunch hour, I no longer had to worry. The materials we practiced with were meals in themselves, so attending class at noon took care of lunch as well. It seemed like a lot of other people had the same idea, because lunchtime was much busier than the other class sections.
Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at 12:10. Students followed the lectures from behind tables instead of desks and held chopsticks instead of pens. The instructor strolled casually between the students and corrected their posture and expressions one by one. In order to return to work on time after forty minutes of class, I had to hurry, but it was still better than going back ten minutes early.
Step One—coffee shop, bakery, fast-food joint, snack bar, neighborhood Chinese restaurant, food court, restaurants near my class, cafeteria
Step Two—Italian restaurant, large Chinese restaurant, traditional Korean restaurant, family restaurant
Step Three—wedding, first-birthday party
Step Four—barbecue restaurant, sushi restaurant
Step Five—unforeseen circumstances
Going by the sequence laid out in class, I’d barely passed step one, but living like this didn’t pose any major obstacles. Any street had plenty of step-one options. However, sometimes you want to eat meat, or sushi, and eventually you grow tired of avoiding restaurants just because they’re filled with large groups of customers. I attended class three times a week without fail and quickly rose to step two. Step two was different from the start. All by myself, I had entered a realm of restaurants in which the first thing I’d be asked at the door was how many people I was eating with.
“If step one was breastfeeding, then step two is soft baby food. You can’t begin by eating rocks. If you get the hang of baby food, your stomach and mind will be a little more comfortable.”
The instructor’s statement was more of a formula than a suggestion, an incantation more than a formula. Not weekends but weekdays, not lunchtime or dinnertime but the hours in between—target those times. Target corner tables rather than those in the middle. Seats at the bar are also good. Hang your coat or bag on the chair facing you and take advantage of tools like a book, earphones, a cell phone, or a newspaper. Become a regular customer and befriend the owner or waiters. Befriending the cook isn’t a bad idea, either. When going to a nice restaurant, call ahead and reserve a table for one. If you make a reservation, no one will pay attention to you. If possible, avoid going out on couples’ days like Valentine’s Day, White Day, or Christmas Eve. Instead, take advantage of niche times like holidays such as New Year’s or Thanksgiving, when restaurants will be empty. All of these guidelines are meant to free solo eaters from the attention of others. Overcoming their stares is the ultimate goal, but if that’s difficult, then avoid them entirely for the time being. They stare at me because I stare at them. If I don’t look at anyone, then I don’t know who’s looking at me.
* * *
For students hoping to kill two birds with one stone by eating lunch during class, the organizers had paid special attention to the type and flavor of the course materials. The materials fee was separate, but considering that it included lunch three times a week, it wasn’t too bad.
“Today we’ll be having steak,” the instructor said. “Steak is a good choice because it requires use of both hands, but it’s inconvenient because it makes reading a book while eating a bit cumbersome. In this case, your best tool is a glass of house wine. Wine is a tool to assist the steak, isn’t it? Let’s think of steak and wine as notes, like we’re in music class. Should I explain this musically? We eat in two-four time. The downbeat is the main course, so steak. The upbeat is a sidepiece, so wine, or something like the potatoes or asparagus here. Yes, that’s right. On the downbeat, cut off a mouthful of steak and eat it, and on the upbeat take a bite of something else, and now you’re eating with a rhythm. One-two, one-two, one-two, one-two! Right! Steak is simple, but you’re wondering what to eat on the upbeat? You can drink your wine, or eat some potatoes or asparagus: anything is fine. The important thing to remember is one-two. It’s the count for a measure in two-four time. After finishing this phrase, your eyes fall away from the plate. You look ahead and pull out a newspaper or something, and your one-measure meal is finished! Oh, you’re looking down too much. If you stare down at your plate like that, you look miserable.”
