Honest poverty

Honest poverty (청빈/淸貧) has been traditionally honored by Koreans.

It was because of the following saying of Confucius. They usually call it the "pleasant way of honest poverty" (안빈낙도/安貧樂道).
 * After eating vegetables and drinking water, I am lying in bed and able to find some pleasure in it.
 * 나물 먹고 물 마시고 팔 베고 누웠어도 그 가운데 즐거움이 있나니/飯蔬食飮水 曲肱而枕之 樂亦在其中矣.

Food
The Korean Peninsula cannot be described as a land that produces an abundance of food, and the people who settled these lands were well accustomed to periods of hunger. Ironically, it was this shortage of food that created a quite diversified Korean diet. Even ingredients that would normally be considered inedible would be cooked to help fill empty somachs, and if a new ingredient didn't kill or cause a severe stomach pain, it would promptly be added to the dietary list.

Among the plants that grow on the peninsula, about 1,000 are edible, and their cooking methods have been passed down to produce a vegetable cuisine of a diversity that would be hard to find in other parts of the world. These vegetables that grow wild on the Korean Peninsula are commonly known as sannamul (산나물), or mountain vegetables.

Sannamul are harvested during spring. That's because the edible parts are the young shoots of grasses and the tender leaves of trees. By springtime, the grains harvested in autumn would have run out. When spring came, Koreans had to go around the hills and fields to gather wild vegetables to eat. It was sannamul that enabled Korean people to survive on this stingy land, and accordingly, sannamul are sometimes called a "semi-staple" food.

Hallyu cuisine
Bibimbap has played a major role in making Korean food known to the world, and the main ingredient of bibimbap is vegetables, so it would not be unreasonable to call this dish namulbap, or "vegetable rice".

The origin of namulbap may well have been sannamulbap. The cooking method of sannamulbap is quite significant as a way of imparting the flavor and aroma of the vegetables to the rice.

Ironically, sannamulbap prevented Koreans from being starved in spring in olden times. But today this low-calorie specialty is highly sought out as a health food.

Abhoring false wealth
The reason why Koreans were pround of honest poverty was to combat the bribery in the public living. The criminal laws punish such bribe-takers.

On the other hand, Koreans have been fond of giving and taking memorable gifts to seniors and friends.

So there are some unofficial (or humorous) criteria to tell a pure gift from bribes.
 * Gifts are handed over on the table while bribes are traded under the table.
 * A gift is exchanged even after the receiver's position was changed. But a bribe cannot be offered when the receiver quits the position.
 * While a bribe is offered by the operation of one's brain, a gift is given from one's heart.
 * After receiving a gift, you can sleep well at night. In case of a bribe, you cannot.
 * If the amount of a bribe is small, it may be regarded as a socially accepted gift under the de minimis rule.