I was excited when The Islander gave me an opportunity to address the entire Jeju-NU community, but now that I am actually thinking about what to write, I have no idea what to talk about. My first idea was to share some advice with you so your journey from college student to working professional would be far smoother than my own, but who actually takes general advice seriously? If I were to share the advice I find most useful, I would tell you to read lots of non-fiction to understand the world around you, and to read lots of fiction to understand the people around you; I would tell you to take less pictures of yourself and more of the great big, beautiful planet you live in; and I would tell you to be nice to each other – above all be nice! – since you never know when your kindness will save someone’s life, or even their kindness yours. But most people don’t appreciate unsolicited advice, so pretend I didn’t say any of the above.

Instead, I will tell you what foreigners think of Korean food by ranking their favorite dishes. My methods of research were very scientific – thinking about the foods I like, basically – so you can be sure every foreigner you meet will agree with my list even though 100% of them probably won’t. That’s because they are all wrong. The list:

1. Bibimbap – The simple combination of fresh vegetables, rice, and egg taste like God cooked it himself. (Herself? Itself?) Even if you make a bad bibimbap it’s still more delicious than any other food in the world. Except burritos, but we’re only talking about Korean food right now so never mind.

2. Kimbab – Delicious and made very quickly. Most importantly it’s cheap. I once bought 20 kimbaps and it only cost me US$3.20.

3. Bibimbap – Whenever I go to Kimbap Cheonguk I look at the menu and think, “I can have any kind of Korean food right now. Ddeokbokki, ramyeon, deopbab, bokkeumbap, jiggae…anything!” And then I order bibimbap.

4. Dakgalbi – Whenever I eat dak galbi with my girlfriend, who is Korean, the waiter always tells her it is too spicy for foreigners. But then I say “gwenchena,” he says “geu-rae,” and my lady and I enjoy a fabulous dinner. Well, I enjoy a fabulous dinner because dakgalbi is too spicy for her. She just drinks her water and thinks about bibimbap.

5. Udon – Just joking. Nobody likes udon because Dokdo is ours.

6. Donkasseu – I’m American, and Americans only eat fried food. If you go to any small town festival in the USA you will be able to eat fried bread, fried ice cream, fried candy bars, fried butter, and even fried shoe. So it is only logical that fried pork cutlet is one of my – I mean every foreigners’ – favorite Korean food.

So there is your comprehensive list of foreigners’ favorite Korean foods. If you ever meet a foreigner you don’t have to ask “What’s your favorite food?” because you will already know.