Shawnodie vs 25 Ju

At home there are probably countless farm markets and grocery stores selling bins full of giant orange pumpkins right now. However, in Korea Halloween isn't a practiced holiday. The kids don't go door to door saying 'trick or treat' for a little bag of kimchi or anything like that. So it was hard to find a pumpkin this year but we did notice a few for sale at the "25 Ju", a 7-Eleven type convenience store down the road from our school. So Mel and I walked in and proudly purchased our Halloween pumpkin Tuesday night for only 5,000 won. The selection was a bit sad... there were only 6 or 7 pumpkins and they were all flat and orange OR tall and green. We selected flat and orange. Not a very healthy looking orange, but it was the right colour at least and we figured it would do the trick.

Once word spread there were 4 teachers and 3 pumpkins at our apartment Thursday night carving pumpkins like children. All pumpkins supplied by the 25 Ju. Here's what happened when we opened the pumpkins to scoop out the gooey insides:

Two out of three of the pumpkins were rotten inside!!! Not just moldy... but wormy. They were maggot infested! We were so dissapointed, because the whole evening was to revolve around proudly putting our pumpkins on display, all lit-up on the balcony. So, we boldy attempted the unthinkable... an exchange. Not easy when you don't speak the language. It was clear that the flat/orange pumpkins were rotten and the tall/green ones were OK. So... we wrote down the Korean words for "maggots!" and "exchange?" (thanks to google translator) and marched off.

When we got to the store there was little confusion about what was wrong, although the shopkeeper still opened up the bags of rotten pumpkin and took a good look at the mess within. She wanted to know if we were planning on eating them (probably best that we weren't) so we drew a little Jack-O-Lantern to explain. We picked up our new pumpkins and headed home. Our first exchange in Korea was a great success!

And I am now pleased to introduce you to our Pumpkin...

We need to name him. Any suggestions?