Interesting side note:
Taco Bell had a franchise here a few years ago (a year before I got here, so this is all second-hand…), and had to close up because it never caught on with the Koreans… one of my students said it was “Nomu may-wo-yo!” (too damn hot!)
update:
No word yet on what “shumyunseki” might mean… fiancee got caught in traffic on her way back into Seoul tonight, got back about 5 hours late, and called me to say that she was just going home (as she didn’t feel well… too much soju last night, I presume! And I forgot to ask her about it while I was on the phone with her!!).
I will see her tomorrow, assuming she’s feeling better, and will ask her then about the vocabulary word of the day…
When I went to Romania six years ago, the only American TV they had was Beverly Hills, 90210 and, of course, Baywatch. When the teen Romanian orphans learned I was from Southern California, they were very excited…but I’m sure this dark-haired, sardonic, definitely non-Pamela-Anderson-Lee-body-type was a bit of a let-down. Ah, yes, reality.
What was a trip was they sold sticker pictures of the 90210 stars in packages of gum, a la baseball cards. Those damn pix were stuck everywhere throughout Beius.
I’m afraid that outside of Kia and Hyundai, my Korean is limited. I can get along fairly well en español. ¿Quién quiere hablar conmigo? Necesito improbar. Y, quiero aprender todas las palabras malas. No les enseñarlas en escuela. 
So… you Americans leave a vewy good impression in Europe too…
We are still blessed with “Baywatch”
also with “Dallas”
and of courre “Nighrider”
If you guys wouldnt “export” Friends and The X Files too you d have much, very much reason to be frustrated hehe
dodgy
BornDodgy, I humbly appologize to you, and to all Europeans! Believe it or not, some of our TV is actually pretty good!
Update on “shumyunseki”: I have asked the fiancee, and several other native Korean speakers, and none of them have any idea what that might mean… tatertot, are you sure you heard that right?
Also possible that “shunyunseki” was a slang word used by the older generation, and the younger ones haven’t heard of it, or that your phonetic spelling of it is somewhat off (causing me to mispronounce it)…
I’ll keep trying, but it doesn’t look promising!