korean barbeque and karaoke

I guess it's "discover Asia's cuisine" week in Margot's world. Tonight I met up with Rina and Jason (fellow Michigan MBAs) for Korean barbeque and karaoke. For those of you who haven't been to Korean barbeque, it looks a lot like this:

Rina's a popular gal so we had about eleven people there, all asian (except for Jason, the token white guy) and all in high-tech. I guess that's what you get in silicon valley. So, back to the food. Korean barbeque is comprised of lots of side dishes with different (usually vegetable based) items, such as pickled cabbage or other veggies, rice flour in its various forms, tofu, seaweed, sprouts, and in one case, tiny crispy sweet fish (you eat them whole!) in a red sauce. Then comes the meat. It's sort of like fajita meat without the veggies, and there was spare rib and also beef. We also had a whole fried fish (delicious!) and be bim bap - the crispy kind. Overall, it was excellent and I think I ate more than I've eaten since I've gotten here.

Post-feast we headed over to Karaoke World, a booth-style karaoke place where you sit in a small room with a large tv (and disco ball) and sing for eachother. It's low-pressure karaoke which is intensified by no alcohol (usually a requirement for American karaoke places). Somehow they tweak the mics and supplement the vocals with backups and doubles so you sound really good when you sing.

Tomorrow I head to the Union Street festival in San Francisco...a more detailed update will follow.