chuseok travels part deux

The next day, we headed to Haeyonde Beach. The weather was fairly nice... and the beach was pretty great. I didn't have a bathing suit or a change of clothes, so I just hung out on the sand.. taking pictures and such. That probably doesn't sound very exciting, but I had fun heh. There were the cutest babies around me that I enjoyed staring at and squealing to myself, wishing that I could just squish one.. just for a second haha.















kung-fu hustle much ?





At night, Ryo, James, and I made the greatest decision ever when we agreed that we should try to hit up the food carts and just eat until we burst. Our first stop was one of the seafood carts. We weren't sure of what to order so thankfully the guys next to us were really helpful and ordered for us. We ate octopus, shrimp, barbequed eel, and some omelet. They were all pretty good. We also polished off two bottles of soju between us and offered some up to the gentlemen next to us since they were nice enough to order for us. Next up, we went to another cart and ate some kim mari(rice noodles wrapped in seaweed and then fried in some tempura like batter).. I think the kim mari in Sinchon beats theirs, for sure. We were also served up some soondae(pig intestines stuffed with rice noodles) and various other pig bits. The soondae was pretty good but the other pig bits were too much for me to handle.. they all had really weird textures and consistencies. To finish off the night, some of us bought hot dducs(rice cakes that are filled with brown sugar + nuts and then fried and flattened like a pancake) After the day of massive eating, we decided to get some alcohol and drink in the park near our motel. It was pretty fun except for the hords of mosquitos which are the biggest assholes in the world. Upon returning from the park, Angelica, James, and I were watching some television where some of the funniest shit ever was on. One channel had a boxing match where one of the boxers had an OBVIOUS advantage .. which was being Andre the Giant's Korean doppleganger with blue hair. The other guy was probably at most 5'10, 170 lbs. It was pretty amusing to watch the little guy try to pummel the blue haired giant, while the giant was laughing because the little guy's fists were tickling his belly. There was also a starcraft channel.. which Ryo and James apparently watched for a while the night before. Another channel had a strange movie where the final scene was two guys on a tight rope.. one had his eyes gauged out for some reason, and the other man looked like a woman for another mysterious reason.. it seemed really emotional.. when all of a sudden the two guys jumped in the air and landed on their balls on the tight rope?? Then I guess their balls propelled them into the air where the last shot was a freeze-frame and yeh, WHAT?? I have no idea.















So, after what seemed like a two week long vacation, it was nice to return "home." It's funny what we define as home and how quickly we've come to adopt Sinchon as our home. Home is where your heart is, right? Awww, *a single tear slowly trickles down the face of a clown...* After it all, I left satisfied albeit stinky after pretty much wearing the same thing every day and mosquito bite-ridden. Apparently my skin is not okay with mosquito bites.. I had a pretty crazy reaction to my bites.. and I got fucking THIRTY of them. Not all of them acted a fool though.. just the ones on my ankles and legs got super swollen.. and some of them got extremely red and bubbly looking. It was definitely pretty disgusting.. every time I showed someone my bites they'd jump back while screaming "UGHHH!!" Yeh, I gross people out THAT much. Some of my friends convinced me to go see a doctor... and they just prescribed me some antibiotic cream, steroid cream, and some calamine lotion which has been helping a lot actually. So, yeh. O.k. now I'm uber sreepy + tired so.. until next time... Peace, Love, and Fuck mogitoes.........!!

Chuseok Travels

So, wow. I just went on a little trip to Gyeongju and Busan and it feels like I've been gone FOREVERS.
We took a huge ass group of us.. 11 people(Jennifer, James, Ryo, Gelly, Silvia, Katharina, Amy, Maricarmen, Max, Stephanie, and myself).. and took a bus that took about 5 hours to get to our first stop, Gyeongju. We were relieved because a professor of mine warned me that it might take up to 22 hours because of traffic.. HOLY SHITS! But luckily, we got there in 5 with very minimal traffic. My Korean grammar teacher had 14 hours of traffic on the way back to Seoul... wow, we were sooooo extremely lucky. Whew. I would NOT have been a happy camper. We left Friday night and got there at about 1am. We stayed at a hostel for about 3 days... which was pretty nice despite the borderline sketch bathrooms.

Waiting for the bus...
















The first night we just decided to just pass out.. so we wake up the next morning and eat duck bbq for breakfast/lunch. That, and some chicken soup.. it was sooo dee-ricious. After that we decided to pay a visit to the Bulguksa temples and the Seokuram Grotto which were really lovely sights to see. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves... and I sure did take a shit ton of them... We found out that 10 other international students from Yonsei were going to be staying at our hostel.. Thanks to Lonely Planet, heh. Also, there were about 17 int'l kids from Ewha university, our neighboring university.. so we decided to make use of the roof access, bought a bunch of booze and had our own makeshift mingle fest. It was really fun and definitely a lot cheaper than hanging out at a bar.


rooftop chillin'.. top: Jesus, Angelica, Katharina, Silvia, me, James..Bottom: Sascha and Ryo



gangsta'

The next day was definitely looking like it was threatening rain.. but we decided to proceed with our plans for a 5 hour hike along Mount Namsam. We ventured out to see Chilburam Maaeseokbum(Reliefs of Buddha of Chilburam). It took us actually only about 1.5 hours to get there.. I was pretty pooped and was shweating like a crazy mofo.. When we finally got up there, I was looking around the mountain tops.. I stupidly exclaimed, "Wait, where are the Buddhas???" to which someone responded, "uh... Are you crazy?" I was looking across to the other mountain faces, but it was right in front of us.... Wow, sometimes I can be so smart.. it really kills me.. We were greeted by some monks who immediately brought us food(rice cakes and potatoes.. which were uber yums) and offered us coffee. They were super accomodating and let us sit out on their steps so that we could duck out from the rain a bit. The sight was so peaceful and serene... it was beautiful. On the way down, I was scared as hell because the rocks were super slippery and I'm afraid of heights.. and my shoes didn't have great traction so I was pretty much on the brink of a minor panic attack. Everyone took note of my extreme spazoidness and started shouting things at me.. such as "Give me your shit!!".. haha, actually no.. it was an extremely sweet gesture as Gelly carried my jacket, Ryo my bag, Amy my scarf, and Silvia offered to trade shoes with me.. and helped me get down the especially daunting rocks by holding my hand. They really are the greatest. <3 I was so grateful because I really was frrrreeeakin. We played a word game on the way down.. where you have to keep adding words to a sequence(but it only has to match the word ahead of it.. e.g., car-jack-hammer-head...) It was entirely too much fun.. and shit got crazy. Well, as crazy as word games can get haha.








Silvia really enjoying them potaters..

The next day, we rode a bus into Busan which is the second largest city in Korea. Our motel was a definite upgrade from the hostel we were at.. and it was cheaper too! Anyways, we were wandering around the Jaljiro markets when Ryo, Jennifer, and I stumbled into a small little pojang machuh(food stand) where they were serving eel. They had a tank full of live eels. Upon ordering, the little grandma stuck her hand in there and started grabbing up some eels. Cool. She then took a spike and pinned the eel's head to her cutting board and started hacking away. When we received our dish, it was a hot plate full of eels(with all their innards still intact..) in the traditional Korean spicy sauce with onions. Was it tasty delicious, you ask? Uhhhhhhhhmmm, after some thought.. I think the general consensus was .. no, not really. The eels looked like pale toes.. and had a really strange texture.. a little bit like cartilage in that it was pretty crunchy and chewy. Yeh........





After our eerie lunch, we walked around and perused the streets. It was a pretty neat sight. They had sooo many food carts. You could even build your own kimbap!





check out that huge line of food carts!

happy to be here

A soju juice box... or as we affectionally call it, the so-juice box. Does that trump Joe's Thaicetea(Thai + Iced + Tea.. which is also a play on tasty).. hmmm.. perhaps it does. Hi Joe. You are probably squirming in your seat right now coming up with reasons why Thaicetea still wins... haha


O.k. I'm going to continue the rest on another post....

rame rain go away.. come again some other day(not)

So tonight some chingoos(friends in Korean) and I are taking a trip down to the southern parts of Korea. Gyeongju is our first stop and then after that we're making our way down to Busan. It's funny because we really wanted to go to Jeju island but now it's completely flooded so it's a good thing we didn't decide to do that. Anyway, apparently parts of Busan are flooded too.. so hopefully it's not too bad otherwise I'm not sure what we'll do. Damn typhoons. Mother nature is not very nice and that's for sure. We're taking a bus down since all the train tickets were booked up way in advance.. one of my teachers said that it might take us 22 hours to get down there with all the holiday traffic.. AGH! Plus, Korean bus drivers + rain = scary ass ride. Hopefully we'll all still be alive at the end of this.. Anyways, talk to everyone in 5 or 6 days.. KNOCK ON WOOD! Happy Chuseok

Time to get mofuggin' serious up in this bizZznatch

Hrrrmm.... loads of thoughts.
It's kind of crazy and strange to think about exactly how fast I've become accustomed to my surroundings. I feel as if I've been here forever as I'm gaining familiarity.. with every day feeling like it's becoming part of the distant past. Some things that only happened a month ago almost feels like they didn't happen.. it just seems SO INCREDIBLY LONG AGO.

I was having a conversation about this exact thing with a friend here.. and he agreed that the transition was surprisingly a lot simpler and smoother than we would have ever anticipated. He also had the same fear that I did.. that maybe BECAUSE the transition was so easy, perhaps it meant that it was time to reevaluate our lives back at home.. maybe we're not heading in the direction that we need to be going in because.. shouldn't there be things that we just can't live without? I don't know.. but the more I think about it, the more I'm confirming the idea in my head that things were pretty great back at home. When people ask me about where I'm from, only good things spring to my mind. Maybe the reason why the transition was so smooth wasn't because things at home weren't great, but maybe it speaks volumes of us as people.. our inner strength and therefore, our ability to adapt to new situations and surroundings.

So, yeh. I have to get serious for a second. I promise this won't happen that often.. since for some of you, it may be out of character for me or whateverrrrs. I honestly feel so proud of myself and for all the numerous amounts of others who are studying abroad/have studied abroad/lived abroad/etc. To step out of your comfort zone and do something that you talked about always wanting to do, really is nothing short of an amazing feat. Most of us didn't come here to escape any horrible atrocities back at home, but rather to gain new perspectives and to ultimately try to better yourself as a person. Upon closer inspection, it seems like most people had it pretty good back at home as well... so to come out to a place where you're experiencing such a culture shock.. where you're facing all sorts of barriers: cultural, language, everything... it's really great to see ..and it creates an almost instant respect from me(which most people who know me know that it isn't easy to come by) So whatever crutch people think they might have come with(having family here, knowing the language, coming with a friend, whatever..), you still put yourself out there to confront who you are as a person and to really take a look at your life. Everyone should feel proud of themselves because hey.. we're freaking warriors. This isn't to say that anyone who hasn't done this is NOT a brave person or a warrior in their own right.

It's funny because some of the things I miss the most are also some of the things that I love the most about being in Korea. IE, familiarity and knowing what to do. It's almost as if every thing you do here, from the most mundane tasks such as ordering in a restauraunt or doing laundry, is an adventure. It's an obstacle to overcome, a mountain to climb, a bear to wrestle.. heh. And every day, things are getting that much easier so it's like instant gratification.

Another strange thing is how I feel as if I can do whatever I want, say whatever I want, wear whatever I want, act however I want... essentially BE whatever I want because no one can really think or say otherwise. O.k. well duh, I know there are certain ethical and moral parameters.. although what are ethics and morals really? (shit, that'll be a topic for later, or maybe on this blog.. never) But it's really weird and kind of fun.. It's refreshing to know that you can tweak your personality to your likings or perhaps even dislikings and nobody will really be able to tell the difference and say "No. This isn't you.. or well, not REALLY you." Insert obligatory friend remarks here, right? "Oh Hannah.. we love who you are.. don't change!", "Gee golly gosh, you sure are neat." But, yeh. I know what my core is like as a person but at the same time, it'll be interesting to see where I am in a year from now... because I truly believe that you learn and grow(or are stunted) by and from experience. Experience is the mother of all knowledge... errrr, forget who says that. O.k. well now it's 4 am and I really ought to get to bed so... take care everybody! E-hugs all around the world.

Ah Yonsei-----!

Maaaan,
bug repellent smells soooooo baddddd ugggghhhhhh.
I feel that all this bug repellent flooding my lungs and nasal passages isn't the greatest thing in the word, but.. uggghh. Fucking mogis. Die mogis die! I honestly wish there were no mogis in existence, EVER. Do they have any special purpose for living?? Will it really affect the food chain if they all just up and disappeared one day? Are pandas going to become extinct because spiders eat mogis, and spiders help bamboo grow, and therefore the pandas will starve(o.k. i know for a fact that none of that is true but do you get the gist, no?)? Is anyone REALLY going to make a documentary called "A Day Without a Mogi" where upon watching it you'll realize.. "Gee, life sure is hard without them mogis" Cmon, REERY?? I'm sippin on mogi haterade, I guess. Woop.

This weekend was pretty crazy.
We went on an IYC(international yonsei club) sponsored trip to the outskirts of Seoul.. where we experienced nature. Real nature! Trees and plants in Seoul, WHAT?! The name of the place was Gapyeon and it was actually really nice.. Gelly + I decided to take the early bus and get our money's worth. The place we were staying at was really pretty and there was even a stream! I love love love love love the sound of moving water.. something about it is so soothing to my ears. So the first half of the day, we spent learning how to play these intense Korean games. Man, Koreans are fucking SERIOUS about their games. They don't take that shit lightly. It was cool because none of them were worried about looking stupid if they were too into it.. it was almost as if if you weren't completely into it, then you'd look stupid. Each song had its own chant with its accompanying hand motions.. and if you lost the games, you would have to take a shot.. and when that person would have to take a shot, they'd have even more accompanying songs. Crazy business. It almost felt like we were at camp, except with tons and tons of booze. Most of the day and night were taken up by playing such games...Ohhh but we had the greatest dinner ever. Our group had to buy supplies for dinner, and our group leader had the most brilliant idea which consisted of us going to a restaurant and getting our dinner from them.. where they individually packaged everything. Genius! We made "Bu de jjeegyeh".. which means, every-f.ing-thing-in-it-stew. We added ramen noodles to it and it was sooooo good. Gelly + I were sick(and still are sick) but this actually made us feel a whole lot better. Yums in my tums.

Later that night, we had a campfire where even more crazyness ensued.
Most people were sloshed at this point after copious amounts of soju + beer. I was pretty sober myself though. The Yonsei students were teaching us all of the school chants and what not that we'd have to know if we were going to attend this special event that's happening on October 5th. I'm not exactly sure of what the event is but from what I gathered, I think it's a baseball game against another school. I don't exactly remember the chants either, or the accompanying dances. Korea really likes their chants with accompanying dances if you haven't figured that part out. We had to do some RIDICULUOUS dances... it was funny and strange because all of the songs sounded like bastardized versions of American songs.. oy? Everyone was dancing their hearts out.. we got REALLY into it. It's actually a little ridiculous how much we got into it. So much that after thinking about it the next morning, it's slightly embarrassing. We were all shweaty mofos by the end of it. It was funny because some Korean girl was like, "You're really good at these dances!" Haha, WEIRD. After we learned all of the chants, we hooked up our own ipods and hardcore ghetto danced. It was a little scary though when this random old creepster dude came out and was taking pictures of us.... most of the international students thought that he was part of Yonsei and so we posed for the pictures.. until all of the Korean students started warning us that he was actually probably just some perv and who knows what he'd do with those pictures... AHHHHH. So hopefully my face won't be popping up on some gross website any time soon. Anyway, the noise got to be too much for the neighbors so we had to move our ghetto dance club indoors.

When we got inside, we plugged in our ipods again.. and we started to dance again.. except this time it was only a few of us Americans.. I bet all the Korean students were thinking to themselves, "stupid fucking americans".. but whatevers, it was a lot of fun. When it came time to go to sleep.. well, at least for some of us.. a lot of the Koreans were still going at it with those games. I told you, they don't fuck around when it comes to these games. Jennifer and I had to share a set of blankets since they ran out.. but as we were sleeping, I got stepped on TWICE. But nobody would even acknowledge that they stepped on me.. W T F ?! I got pissed the second time and I was like "holy shit. I am out of here" After I went outside, I found out that we could leave early if we just paid for the taxi ride to the train station. It was 6 am at this point.. A group of us were like "HELLS YES" because it was impossible to sleep... we were all feeling gross as hell from the night before.. and someone was persuading us to stay.. saying that if we waited 5 hours, we could get picked up in the shuttle bus that will go to the train station. We looked at each other with annoyed expressions that seemed to scream "Fuck NO" The cab ride was only 2 bucks each and it was worth it to get home early... everyone else that left later said that they had to sit on the floor of the trains.. so thank goodness we left early. CHYEH.

Ohhh.. so I met a really stupid guy at this event. At first, I thought he was kind of cute.. and then I found out when he was born (1989.. GROSS!) and then I talked to him(EVEN MORE GROSS!) He was talking about how much he hates gay people.. he actually had the audacity to say, "I don't know what it is but every time I see a gay guy, I just want to beat the shit out of him." WHAT THE HELL?! Upon hearing this, I say "Ohhh.. well I know why.. it's because you're ignorant!" I lay down some more insults except I think this guy is too stupid to even understand that I'm insulting him... and I'm being blatant. Another gem that came from this guy's mouth was, "Oh I used to be a Communist for about a year." What the fuck!? Who is this guy??? Ugh, some people really gross me out.

Anywayyyy.
A pretty large group of us made plans to leave Seoul for Chuseok break(Korean Thanksgiving) Pretty awesome!
We got bus tickets(since plane and train tickets are already all booked) to go to the southern cities of Korea (first stop, Gyeonju and then Busan) We're leaving Friday night and then coming back Wednesday afternoon. Hopefully it will be tons of fun! HAPPY SHIT!

i'm really bad with titles...

So yeh.
Hmm... update time! I should update more frequently so that I actually remember everything I want to write down. And so that the posts won't be so horribly long... and don't worry. Now that I have the internet, there will be supplimentary pictures for your viewing pleasure! That way I won't just be posting long chunks of just woooords since I know that's not the funnest thing in the world.

little buddies just hanging out.. or they're just being forced to hang out. If this was a hollywood film, these dogs would have busted out of some prison together.. but they're coerced into tolerating each other because they're each other's keys to freedom. And one of the dogs happens to annoy the shit out of the other one(the small dog would probably be annoyed by the bigger dog... hey, i didn't make the rules. that's just usually how it goes)... and when they finally get free of each other, they go their separate ways.. until one day the small dog hears that the big dog is in trouble.. and against his/her better judgement or desires, he feels he has to save the big dog because he realizes how much he actually cares about him.. YEH. tearjerker or what! hooray for trite hollywood movie formulas. anthropomorphism <3


Anyways, what have I been doing the past few days? I have no idea... but.. since I've pretty much been taking pictures.. I'm going to try to piece it together since my memory's a little sketch right now. It's 3 in the mooooornin! James took me and Gelly to his favorite coffee shop which I have to admit.. was pretty great. And they don't blare kpop or any crappy ass American hot 100 shit. They were even screening The Snowman! An awesome movie from my childhood.. if anyone hasn't seen it, check it out! It's made in 1982 but the animation is pretty nifty.

James + Gelly


The Snowman!!


I also happened to grab lunch with my "buddy." I joined a program called language exchange through the yonsei global program, and they pair us up with a Korean buddy. It's nice because with Mentors Club, it was 1 buddy and 10 international buddies.. but with language exchange, it's a one-on-one thing. My buddy's name is Jae Hyun, and he seems to be a pretty neat guy. He's majoring in Korean literature.. how cool is that? He's also been playing this traditional Korean instrument(ah, the name has slipped my mind for the moment) since he was 12 years old! He says that the sound resembles that of a violin.. and he said that he'd teach me how to play. Fucking awesome!! I've wanted to learn to play the violin for a while now, but I think it' d be even cooler to learn to play this instrument.

Jae Hyun


Man, the 12th was Lissy's birthday so she had the greatest idea ever... or it pretty much turned out to be the greatest idea ever.. we compiled a pretty big group of people and headed over near Han River where we got the BEST MEAL I'VE HAD IN KOREA THUS FAR. It might have even been one of the greatest meals, ever. It was a pretty epic dinner.. I can't emphasize that enough. We ate sangyupsal which is where you wrap meat in lettuce with rice and other delicious veggies. Man, I wouldn't mind going back to eat there every day until the end of time. The service was great too and the guy who owned the place was so nice and accomodating. He was soo funny. At the end of the meal, we were trying to count out our money to pay.. and we were pulling out some change and he's peering over our shoulders, when he decides to throw in some money as well. He also had us give a round of applause for his wife who made the delicious kimchi. And get this.. he lined us all up at the end of the meal as we were leaving to give us all high-fives! I LOVE HIGH-FIVES! Haha.. ok I'm weird. Man, I love communal eating.. it's so much fun and creates such an awesome environment. Oh... funny story. We were walking out of the subway station, when a random guy comes up to Silvia and jabs his finger into her face.. and then has some crazy wide eyed expression(think evil wizard) and wriggles his fingers into her face. She starts laughing histerically when Katharina asks her what's so funny.. at that exact moment, before Silvia cold even answer, the guy poked Katharina in the face and did the same thing. What the fuck? I wish I could have seen it but I nearly died laughing after Katharina told me... whew

Check out those tubes. Seems straight out of the Terry Gilliam movie Brazil, riiiiight?


delicious slabs of meat...


happy pace!


After dinner, we headed over to a store to pick up some booooooze. Basically, some soju, orange juice, and some 40s. We walked over to the Han River where we just hung out and drank.. and ate the cake that we bought for Lissy. Lissy also happened to have a bag of tasty German sweets.. Haribo! The Germans + I also happened to discuss my .LOVE. for kinder hippos. Oh kinder hippos, how I love and miss you so. It was funny because where we were at Han River, felt like the scene where the monster is introduced in The Host. But luckily for us, the monster didn't come out and attack us.. hopefully we'll be as lucky the next time we visit as well. It was a really nice night and it was soo much fun just drinking and hanging out by the river. It was nice to just have a mellow night.

Nina at the tunnel leading to Han River


Ugh, my camera sucks at night time. The best picture I could manage at Han River


James + Jorn


Katharina + Amy


yayyy

Duuuuude. So mosquito bites here are KILLER. I haven't gotten bitten that much.. especially in comparison to other folks here but fuck. The ones I have are pretty insane. They've gotten UBER swollen and they're so uncomfortable. They're all on my feet too! Motherfucker! One is on the back of my foot.. right where my shoes would be touching if I put them on so I haven't been able to wear normal shoes since it hurts like a bitch. My bites are itchy and painful at the same time. Total fuck nuts. So I bought repellent and am trying to wear it all the time.. even though it smells pretty bad. Or I can just buy a biohazard suit... Shrug, whichever.


GROOOOOOOOSSSS! Check out how swollen it is... dis-gust-ing?

So today, Jennifer's buddy, Jee Eun, took us shopping in Myungdong today. It was pretty fun.. we ended up out there for about 4 hours! Even though we all didn't really take home that much stuff. I bought a scarf, Jennifer bought a skirt and a shirt, and Jee Eun bought some earrings. It was pretty fun though although Korean street vendors and mall workers are all really intense and aggressive. They'd try to speak English to us.. and one guy called out, "Where are you from?".. and I said, "San Francisco".. and he was like "What?! Why are you saying it like that?! You have to say it like San-pu-ran-sis-su-co".. which I guess is the Korean way to say it. I wasn't quite sure how to respond except with an uncomfortable face and a quicker speed of walking. The cool thing though is that you can haggle.. or at least I'm going to try to learn how to. I usually end up feeling really guilty and buying something that I'm so-so enthusiastic about at a HIGHER price than listed.. just so I can feel like I just fed that street vendor's kids some ice cream that they haven't ate in 5 years.... ugh. So yeh, Jee Eun is an expert at haggling apparently.. she'd put on a cute smile and be like "please cut the price".. and if something was 3,000 won she'd go "how about 2,000 won?" and would somehow get her way. I need to learn this.

Anyyyyyywayyyyyyyy...
The International Yonsei Club is having a trip this weekend to the outskirts of Seoul. For about $25 bucks, that includes all accomodations + transportation. HELLS YES! Hopefully that will be all sorts of fun. Also, Korean Thanksgiving(Chuseok) is coming up soon so we're trying to plan some vacationing.. although we wanted to go to either Jeju or Busan.. the tickets for transportation are already all taken.. ugh. Anyways, if anyone has any ideas please send them my way!

MUAH.

p.s.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ponB8Hd_lG4

in case anyone wanted to watch The Snowman

pictures

It seems that at this grand hour of 2am and beyond while walking through the streets of Seoul... it's inevitable that you'll come across several belligerent nerds engaging in a round of almost-fisticuffs. It never gets past the slurred trash talking, but I always watch with bated breath, wondering if anyone will be ballsy enough to throw a punch. I love love LOVE watching baseball fights but something about witnessing a fight in real life makes me really nervous. Anyways.. here's some pictures that you guys have been waiting for. Or.. as in guys, I mean.. the very very small group of people that reads this. I don't even know if it can be called a group.. I'm not exactly sure how many people I'd need for it to actually be a legitimate "group".. o.k. uhm, tangent much? here we goes


I guess smoking is ok but absolutely no smorking of any kind is allowed.


the death cell


shinchon!


amy and james at beer bar


Uhm, some useful things to say while you're in Korea I guess. This was from a book that was given to one of my friends by a Korean student.. apparently it also had some really vulgar expressions in there as well.. but we don't need to get into that.


Angelica, Jennifer, me, James, and Ryo at Doctor Fish Cafe


fishy feeding time! Bon appetit ... of feet!


Jason, Angelica, Jennifer, James, Ryo, me, Derek, and Jenny at "Happy Days"


BLOODS!


the cousins at the Hyundai mall food court


line em up! strawberry soju


birthday cakey!! <3




the random locals we met, Seulgi and Hwangshik


noraebang!


perhaps in the middle of singing mmbop... yeh..................... don't ask


David, Jake, Jennifer, James, and Derek doing cigarette smoking/winky pace


some super cool uber korean hipster-ish band

wasty pace

Wasty pace = wasted face (Korean style)
Anyways, it's been a crazy past few days! I FINALLY FINALLY FINALLY have the internet at home.. so no more sneaking into the dorm's pooter bang(computer room.. bang is room in korean). It's actually pretty funny because when the internet guy came to my place today.. I was SO extremely tired that I slipped into bed and started to fall asleep without even a word to the internet guy. Then I realized (except only after probably about 5 minutes) that that was probably an extremely creepster move so I was like "sorry.. I'm really tired" and then proceeded to pass the fuck out again. This was a really stupid move on my part because who knows? I could've woken up with all my valuables gone... forevermore. I did wake up to say bye and thank you to him so I did mind my manners! Anyway, important thing is.. TIME TO BE A l337 n3rd again! w00tz0rz!

Jebus Christopher.
I've been so crazy tired lately because I've pretty much been going out EVERY DAY.. even with all of my classes(some being 9 am.. an ungodly hour if you ask me.. and this is my blog so yeh.. you ARE asking me) Hmm.. where do I begin? On September 5th, I went to go back to this bar called Festival.. which is where I had my first "wasty pace" experience in Korea. Holy shit.. I hope they don't remember us! Well, thank goodness they didn't.. because they probably would have barricaded the doors had they known. Anyways.. a bunch of peeps and I were at Festival and they surprised me with a birthday cake and a super neato card! Honestly, that was one of the sweetest gestures anyone has ever made for me.. ESPECIALLY because I've only known these people for about a week.. some for only a few days! So if any of you guys are reading this, thank you so much! It was truly a great experience... *happy tear* Anyway, the cake was deeee-lish and we got strawberry soju which was also quite tasty. Afterwards, James, Jennifer, Derek, and I were the only ones left so we decided to continue our fun night out. We were about to cross an intersection when this adorable little Korean girl shyly said hello to us(I was with 3 halfies so I think we stood out a little). Derek struck up a conversation with her and the guy she was with and then they asked us if we wanted to go hang out with them. HELLS YES! A golden opportunity to mingle with the locals! We head to this bar and hang out there until about 3 am.. having the freaking greatest time ever with these people. It was even educational because I learned all the names of my fingers in Korean. Awesome! Afterwards, we went to noraebang(karaoke) which was conveniently located in the same building. We then sang the night away with great hits such as Bohemiam Rhapsody, Y.M.C.A., Buddy Holly, No Scrubs, Candy by H.O.T!!!, Lovefool... jebus, I can't even remember all the songs. Fiiiinally, when the little Korean girl(Seulgi) fell asleep and Derek got super wasty pace and passed the fuckkkkk out we decided to leave. At the end, we all exchanged numbers and vowed to hang out soon again. Yeh... I got home at 5 in the morning. Woke up and went to class the next morning like a true soldier.

Man, today was fan-fucking-tastic as well because a couple of us decided that we wanted to check out the Korean indie rock scene. I know what you're thinking.. "Wait, does that even exist?" Apparently it does! We checked out some random clubs that had live bands... while we were searching for some places, this random old Korean hipster looking guy approaches us and tells us that he'll help us find a place. This guy speaks English and even some German(because he lived there for 11 years) Holy moly. Anyway, he takes us to this place called "Funky Funky" Great name, right? The price is about $12 but we were a bit hesitant so the guy offered tickets to us for $6. Could we really say no? We got to watch about 5 bands. The first band kind of sucked.. except they did this rocked out version of "Build me up buttercup" that was pretty entertaining. The second guy is apparently pretty famous but he was kind of weird and wasn't that great either. The third band was completely awesome! They were these uber Korean hipster kids.. I'm not even sure I remember what they sounded like but the lead singer was this super hot Korean girl who was really charismatic and soooo fun to watch. Later on during the other bands' sets, she danced with me and put her arm around me! Thumbs up!!! The 4th band was just all covers... they did stuff like "Placebo- Every me, and every you," "T-Rex-20th Century Boy," and then HOLY SHIT. They did "Pixies-Where is my mind?" HO-O-OOOLY SHIT. How completely mindfucking awesome is that?! It was a really good rendition too! It was like rummaging through a pair of pants you haven't worn for a while and stumbling across a $20 bill.. completely unexpected and totally fucking sweet. They closed out with "Kylie Minogue -Can't get you out of my head" which was actually really fun. i know a lot of you guys are groaning but shut up. If you were in that club, you would have been dancing and singing your ass off and basically having the time of your life. I struck up a conversation with the lead singer as well since he was super friendly.. and he told me that he was really into Brit pop. Aww, haha. The last band was pretty good too except that they sounded like every other popular garage rock band.. pretty much exactly like the strokes.

Anyway, what a fun night! Meanwhile the entire night, the guy that introduced us to the place is constantly getting us drinks. He bought us shots of tequila, some beer, and even some cocktails. He seemed super cool, albeit super eccentric.. after the band night was over, he suggested we go to another bar where he said he'd treat us out. Cool beans.. but when we got to that bar, it started to get kind of sketch. He bought us all Guiness which was a really nice gesture... but then he ordered a really expensive bottle of whiskey and then we all started feeling really strange. Lissy said it best when she said that she felt like she was a hostess, as if we were getting paid to sit with him. At this point, I know he's probably really drunk and.. ugh. I feel bad but we all decided that things were getting way too strange and some of us were getting some really bad vibes and feelings off of him so we thanked him, and peaced the fuck out. I'm probably not giving enough details... but I don't know. Maybe I've watched too many scary movies but something about this situation just really didn't feel right so I honestly truly felt that I had to get the heck out of there. I don't know... ahhh all of us left feeling extremely guilty because who knows.. maybe this WAS just a really nice old guy(let me just add eccentric again for the extra effect) who was a bit lonely and needed some company... but honestly, we didn't want to owe the guy anything... and it was just all too completely strange and foreign to us. I still don't really know what to think about the situation to be quite honest.. ugh.

Blah. So let's change the subject, shall we? Thank you to everyone who sent me the birthday comments, emails, and messages. I was really overwhelmed by all the kind words and I honestly do appreciate them all so much. I'll be sure to post pictures soon.. I'll probably make a post dedicated entirely to pictures. O.k. so take care guys! Talk to you soon. LOVE.

a quick update

I was walking down the street today when I encountered two pigeons and I was instantly reminded of San Francisco. Sometimes it's the small things in life that really bring you back home. Albeit.. small disgusting little things, but small things nonetheless. I miss everyone at home but I'm honestly having such a blast right now. I wish you guys were here!

I went to a place called "Doctor Fish Cafe" yesterday where for 8 dollars, you get a drink, some food, and you get to stick your feet in a pond where these little fish eat all of the dead skin cells off of your feet. Or someone else said, "They eat all of the bad stuff off of your feet." I'm not sure how discriminating they are(I mean.. come on, they might only eat the crud off of our feet because they have no other choice for food) but the experience was weeeeeird. It felt so strange having all of these little fish come up to your feet and just feed off of them. When I started getting used to the small fish, I felt a bigger set of chompers on my foot.. looked down and sure enough, it was the friggin' Shaquille O'Neil of feet-feeding fish. Ughhhh don't touch me. It was definitely fun though and hopefully I'll go back again.. and hopefully this time I'll be a lot less squeamish. It sucks because if you move around too fast, they die. So there were some dead little feet eating fish floating up at the top. Gross.

After Dr. Fish, we went to a super ghetto looking hole-in-the-wall bar and I had honestly one of the funnest nights in Korea so far. I got pretty drunk but don't worry. I never get TOO drunk, mind you! I can hang.. haha. I got to meet some cool people and so it was fun to be in good company.

Anyways.. I have to head off to school! Most of my classes seem good so far.. I took a placement test for my Korean classes yesterday.. it was uber difficult. SO hard. It had a speaking portion + a written portion and I don't think I did that well on either. I actually quit midway through because it was getting way too strenuous. I think everyone except for one person in my class gave up on the test. UGH. After the test, I met a girl.. who upon first meeting me asked me "Do you know how to speak Korean?" And I had to think for a second before I replied, "You know... I really don't know. I just took a test that told me that I probably don't." Eep. Hopefully I won't be in too low of a level class.

Anyhow.. I'm finding it really strange that this is slowly becoming my reality..

many adventures

I see someone's foot in there air and his toes are wiggling suggestively. Okay I don't know if toes can really wiggle suggestively but.. I thought that'd be cool to say.

Anyways. I'm at an internet cafe right now since I don't have the world wide web at my home yet... boooo. All around me are guys playing starcraft, or warcraft, or whatever it is that guys in Korea play. Internet is pretty cheap at these places.. only about $1/hr so it's nice. I tried to use the bathroom here though and I found out that it was one of those dingy little holes in the ground. Oh hells no(ghetto voice) I guess I'm way too used to the westernized world for my own good but honestly, I'm so clumsy that I'd probably end up slipping and falling into a puddle of my own feces. I KNOW, right? Then there you have it. You wouldn't do it either. Unless you're a guy since it wouldn't really make that big of a difference.. Fuck the cockocracy!

The past few days have been really fun. I joined some international clubs so I've been able to finally meet some people. It's a bit difficult to meet people since I don't live in the dorms, so I've had to force myself to be super outgoing and wow, wait for it... actually talk to people. Anyone who actually knows me is going to be so proud of me since I normally don't talk to people.. unless I have to(IE: waiting tables) It was kind of intimidating and frightening to say the least.. because everyone at the welcome parties seemed to hang out with the people they came with(ie, the people they first met) Okay come on.. no one really likes default friends. So I would just awkwardly trot up to each random little clique, thrust out my absurdly small little hand and would loudly ask, "HI!! Where are you from??" I might have even busted out into a song and dance with jazz hands and all.. and somehow I'd suddenly be wearing a sequined tuxedo.....Ok, I jest.. but anyways. I had to overcompensate is all I'm saying. It seemed to work somewhat.. haha.

The first two days I got immensely drunk. The first night, me + some other people went to a bar called Festival and got completely shitfaced. I think I had 2 beers + 12 shots of Soju total that night. For me, soju is really gross.. it tastes and smells like rubbing alcohol. But then again, I'm not really a fan of hard alcohol. Our table was a complete trainwreck. The table was drenched in soju and everyone had their Asian glow working overtime(even the ones that weren't Asian) I can't even remember a second where we weren't clinking our shot glasses in the air yelling "GANBE!!" which is apparently "cheers" in Korean? We also ordered pitchers of flavored soju which were actually quite tasty. So far I've tried three different flavors: pineapple, yogurt, and peach. I think peach is my favorite thus far.

The second night was a lot more mellow. The mentors club was a lot more fun than the IYC club. It's cool because they actually pair you up with a Korean buddy so you can meet some locals. However, I guess there aren't that many Korean students in the club so the international students to Korean buddy ratio was like 10:1. My buddy seems nice though.. I wonder if I will ever see him again. Anyway, the mentors club put on a hip-hop dance show that was super entertaining. They had on all the cheesy American TRL top 10 music and were trying to krump and such. It was awesome. Afterwards, most people went clubbing but a few people and I decided to save money and just go to bars. We first ended up at some sort of beer bar where the beer was all imported and put out in front of you. The set up was really cool but we found out that it was incredibly expensive.. something like 7 bucks a bottle.. but at that point we had already munched on their free snacks and we didn't want to be assholes.. so we got 3 bottles of beer to share for like.. 8 people. Haha, but then this creepy old Korean guy sends us over 3 more bottles for free! It was funny because one minute Felix(from Germany) was sitting with us, and the next he disappeared.. we looked up and he was sitting with creepy old Korean guy(cokg for short) Cokg pulls out some shot glasses and starts pouring Felix(who is shooting us looks of desparation) some Hennessey. James proceeds to join them and cokg propositions them into taking a cab out to another city. Uhm, holy crap? I ask Lissy(also from Germany) to say to Felix in German "Hurry up and drink the shot so we can go".. and Felix replies, "I can't. If I drink it, he just keeps pouring more" Finally we manage to wrestle Felix away from cokg and get the heck out of there. Haha.

Last night, we decided to take it easy and lay off the drinking. Two nights in a row of crazy alcohol seems to wear people out. We ended up going to a place that had frozen yogurt and coffee. James and I headed up to the counter to order some drinks.. the counter people stared at each other and then back at us in complete confusion. And then James and I proceeded to stare at each other and then back at them also in complete confusion. Let's just say that the proper word to describe the situation was.. UNCOMFORTABLE. We finally manage to get our drinks and we sit back at the table feeling somewhat dejected and still confused as to why ordering was so difficult.. hrm.

At the end of the night, a few of us went back to my place. I thought that my old laptop's battery was leaking so I begged Allen into looking at it. It doesn't look like battery acid and it actually smells like soy sauce.. Allen looks at it and confirms that it probably is soy sauce and that it's not even leaking where the battery is. WHAT THE HELL?? Why is there soy sauce in my computer?? I found a note in my luggage stating that my bag had been searched.. and all of a sudden, I got a mental picture of some crazy drunk Korean airport security guys using my laptop as a small table.. all the while slurping and spilling soy sauce all over my poor laptop. Yeh.. I have no idea.

Anyyyways. Korea has been pretty cool so far. Everyone I've met seems nice enough and I've actually been really interested in hearing why people decided to study abroad in Korea(ESPECIALLY non-Koreans) I've met people from all over the world: Austria, Germany, France, Sweden, Denmark... and the general consensus seems to be that they wanted to try something different other than the usual places that most other students go. That's super awesome. (Although I did encounter one strange annoying little French guy who said that he found Korean food to be absolutely disgusting and ate at McDonalds everyday. Uhm, hello?) I'm trying to get to know people from other countries so that I'll have a place to stay if I visit there haha. Score!


I moved into my new place and I absolutely love it. My neighorhood/city is cool since it's a college town so pretty much everyone I see on the street is a college student. But yeh.. seriously, anyone who wants to visit me.. consider this an open invitation. School starts tomorrow.. w00t! I'll put up pictures as soon as my internet is up and going.. promise! Hope everyone's doing well at home! love love love