All Aboard the Smoking Bus

Had a snack with The Stumbler this afternoon to catch up on his USA trip and daughter's wedding--it all sounds like it was lovely--in the Beer King at the Sinjeongnegeori area.

Since the smoking ban a few years ago, many bars and restaurants have installed a sealed off, generally really small, smoking booth, often jokingly called things like the gas chamber, the cancer cubicle and so on.

Ding! Ding! The Smoking Bus is now boarding.


It's quite roomy compared to many such booths:


And had a message in English, as you often see on cafe walls. As not all that often seen, the grammar was correct:


In case you have trouble reading that, it says: "It is regrettable that many smokers are still lighting up in unauthorized areas. So, it's for you. This area is designated for smoking."

Smokin' and Drinkin' in Seoul

Last year, Seoul began a pogrom, or at least a crackdown, on smoking in public places such as bars, restaurants and coffee shops. Of course, lots of such establishments already banned smoking, but this was a public ordinance. Many places also had separate smoking areas or rooms. Reading the fine print, it only applied, however, to places larger than 150 sq.m. Using fire marshal code, that means any place that seats more than 40 people.

As of January 1, 2015, the size carve-out was stricken, and smoking rooms were abolished if they did not have direct access (i.e., doors or windows) to the outside. Not to be too blunt, but smoking in a bar was always one thing in Korea's favor, in my book. Also on January 1, the price of a pack of (my brand of) cigarettes escalated from 2,700 W to 4,500W--all of it in tax. This is part of the government's "two-prong approach" to curbing cigarette use.

I don't deny cigarettes are bad for my health, and I don't object to paying a premium for insurance purposes to offset the burden on the health care system. Fine. But, and I suspect quite a lot of business owners agree with me, it's not really the place of the government to tell a business how to run itself. Those of you worried about second-hand smoke, you would do much better to outlaw using single-stroke lawnmowers. And motorcycles.

But in a very low blow, a new regulation has been passed to outlaw drinking alcohol in most public places, including parks, beaches and college campuses. Literally millions of Koreans every weekend hike up a mountain (many of them public parks) and pause at the top to guzzle a few bottles of soju before making their way down. I frankly don't see this tradition being changed.

I don't hike up mountains, so I don't give a rat's ass about that. However, I frequently sit outside of restaurants--dining al fresco--while guzzling a few bottles of soju. Some of these restaurants own that space, but others just sort of spill out onto the sidewalk. I just wonder where the line will be drawn in the enforcement.

But again, this is a Nanny State move. According to the article here, the move comes from the Ministry of Health and Welfare, who estimates that 1.6 million Koreans are "alcoholics". Yeah, riiiight!

Nosmo King, Inaction Man

December 8th, 2012, was a red-letter day in Korea. Korea welcomed itself into the list of countries that qualify as "nanny-states", those states that deign to tell people what they can and cannot do for their own good. A smoking ban was enacted in bars and restaurants.

(Full disclosure: Tuttle smokes. Not during the ordinary course of a day, really. But certainly two with my Diet Coke, er Coke Light, first thing in the morning, maybe three. And if I'm drinking of an evening, all bets are off. If I'm not having alcohol, however, I'm unlikely to light up.) (Oh, except if I'm having a Caramel Frappucino at Caffe Bene: I smoke then, too.) (Or if I'm driving a car. Which isn't an issue in Seoul, but it was when I was visiting the States in August, and had a rental with a circle-and-a-slash symbol on the ashtray.) (Fine. I hung one out the window a few times. I was careful though. Whatever.)

When I say a smoking ban was enacted on December 8th, I really mean: not so much. For example, the recently-opened Beerking hof across the street from my officetel still had ashtrays on the tables when I dropped in two days later. On the other hand, that place has eleven tables, and may fit one of the exceptions to the new law, of being under 100 sq. m. of serving area.

However, when I met up with my weeknight dinner regulars at a well-known izakaya in Gang-seo-gu-cheong earlier this week, I was disappointed to see a photocopied circle-and-a-slash cellotaped to the front door. I complained to the sajangnim that this new law is kind of silly and they should at least have a smoking section--it is after all, an extensive establishment well-over the 150-m2 mandated for pulmonary protection of the pissants. When she brought me my beer, she slid an ashtray across to me as well. In fact, we soon noticed that almost every table in the place had at least one smoker lighting up with impunity, and, may I say, relish.

As we left Warawara the izakaya, my friends noted they were living up to the law, in some interpretation, at least: there was a small glass-enclosed booth labeled "Non-smoking Area" with two tables in it. (Alas, I wonder if in 2015, when they start actually handing out fines, smokers won't be on the inside looking out.)

Our dinner round that night was at a similarly-sized place where we enjoyed gabeurisal cooked on a grill at our table, with carcinogen-laden charcoal smoke leaching into the atmosphere despite the fume hoods that are so ubiquitous in Korean barbeque. That being so, they didn't have the gumption to tell anyone smoking is not allowed. Even though it isn't.