Happy Easter!

Yesterday, while on the subway, I realized something. Namely, teaching in Korea is a lot like college. You're young, you don't have a car, you spend a lot of time in classrooms, and it's both easy to party super-hard, or just be a hermit and hang out in your little room somewhere. Also, the beer is pretty crappy. Though for the full college experience, I'm gonna have to find some nerds to play D&D with.

I've been taking it pretty easy this last week. As I mentioned in my previous post, last Saturday was crazy ridiculous, so it took me a day or two to get caught up on sleep. Fascinating, I know. So thus far, my weekdays have the same typical pattern. I could stand to mix things up a bit, probably- I imagine I'll be hanging out at the local park a bit more once things get warmer. Not to say it's dreary right now, but the trees are still beginning to bloom. Greenery, and all that.

Though I still make progress! Yesterday, I got on the subway and popped over a station, whereupon I got myself a Korean CostCo card. Woo. The costco itself was a ZOO- not too surprising, considering it was a weekend. I kind of wonder if I should've brought my camera- but then again, pallets full of olive oil probably aren't all that interesting.

The actual shopping part of CostCo is underground- the lack of natural light, and the plain grey concrete everywhere reminded me of a bunker (which, for all I know, might be its secondary purpose). They were giving out tons of free samples, which was neat: ice cream, cheese, wine, beer (Miller, admittedly, but free beer is awesome), and even vitamin supplements. I passed on that one, as taking an unidentified pill in an outlet store struck me as a bad idea. Though the real kicker about that is, it's not like you can 'taste' a vitamin supplement pill, or even feel the effects right away. Go fig.

The sample-highlight was the cheese, though- I had a sample of genuine blue cheese, and I couldn't help but melt a little once I had it. I mean, it's been two months since I've had any cheese besides Korean-made imitation-American (which is good for fast food and/or grilled cheese sandwiches, and not much else). I went home with some tortillas and a two pound block of colby jack, so that's exciting. Quesadillas! They will be delicious and all for me.

I did more exciting (ish) stuff today, however. I made it a point to wake up early, so I could make the hour subway ride down to the Myong-dong cathedral for their 9am English mass. There's actually a catholic church a bit closer to my neck of the woods...but I've no idea how to get there. No nearby subway stations, unfortunately.

So that's why I went to Myong-Dong Catherdral. It's over a century old, but in very good condition. I'm afraid I didn't snap too many pictures- as I didn't want to be TOO touristy, especially since I was there for the service. I got there about 15 minutes early, which worked out well- as by the time Mass started, it was standing room only. Probably about an even mix between Koreans and expats.

 If you look at the left of my crappy photo, you'll notice a flatscreen TV. They had TV's & speakers mounted on the pillars, showing the altar. I'm sure they're not the first Cathedral to do this, but I couldn't help but be amused at the juxtaposition between old & new. Then again, I wouldn't be surprised if they do the same in Rome, and the Cathedrals are a lot older there.

The service was surprisingly short, too- started at 9, and we were out of there by 9:50- and as we were walking out, there were already people lined up for the next mass (whenever that was). Go fig! Again, due to the crowds, I'm afraid I didn't get very many pictures.

The funny thing is, Myong-dong is a big shopping district- so you walked out of church, turned the corner, and you get to see this.

The place is an absolute warren of shopping malls and restaurants and the like. Interesting enough- though in Korea, not much tends to be open in the morning. Things are open late, sure- but most stuff doesn't get going 'til at least 11 or 12, at the very earliest.

Not that there was all that much to get my attention in the first place. A large percentage of the stuff there is either for clothes (and we all know how fashionable I am), for cellphone stuff (and I already have a cellphone), or skin-care beauty makeup girly stuff. I did find a little record store, but I didn't feel like sticking around 'til it opened. Perhaps I should do s'more research into finding cool/nerdy stuff to poke around.

So after meandering through Myong-Dong, I hopped back on the subway- a few stops later, I was back at Craftworks, whereupon I treated myself to brunch (with beer, natch). They've just released a new IPA, which is nice & bitter. I'm not a huge hop-head, but again, it's always nice to appreciate a proper beer (especially considering how crappy Korean beer is).

So yeah. Did some reading, enjoyed my brunch, and...headed back to Ilsan. I did a little shopping, a little writing, and otherwise had a nice and lazy Sunday. And since it's Easter, I nabbed some Korean candy- this stuff called peporo- cookie sticks dipped in chocolate. It's basically the Korean equivalent of Pocky, and therefore delicious.

So yeah. Uneventful week, but there's nothing wrong with that. I've got some nebulous plans for this next week, however- including possibly going to see the RockTigers at long last. Whooo!

Late. Again. Entirely my fault. I suppose the initial novelty of a blog is wearing thin- that, and I'm not exactly sure what to post! I'm kiiiiind of getting into a kind of routine, I guess. It's comfortable...but doesn't make for the best of blogging.

And so, I'll ask you guys- what kind of stuff would you like to see? More day to day 'living in Korea' stuff? Touristy things? Explorations of the underground Korean music scene? I'm at least planning on seeing the RockTigers on the 30th, so that should be a highlight.

But yeah- post comments! Tell me what you'd like to see. I love comments. Means somebody's paying attention. Blogging is proving to be kind of hard, to tell the truth. Right now, I'm going for a conversational, informative tone...but I'm also afraid such a tone might be kinda boring. I just need to find the right spin on things. Maybe make it funnier- but as the saying goes, "dying is easy, comedy is hard."

Regardless! Last Friday, we got to go on a field trip. Woo! We go on field trips once a month, so that's fun. Easy way to get out and about (and don't have to worry about teaching classes that day, either). Originally, we were supposed to go to the zoo- but it was kind of grey and sprinkly that day. To which the principal told me that they didn't want to expose the kids to the rain, yellow dust, or radiation from Japan. So, uh, I guess that's a very thorough excuse.

So that morning, in the span of about 15 minutes, I was told:

1) We're not going to the zoo, so the kids are just going to watch movies all day.

2) We're going to watch a movie, THEN go to the zoo. It's not so bad outside!

3) What're you waiting for? We're leaving right now!

4) We're not going to the zoo- but rather, to...uh, this insect museum place.

It was a lot more interesting on the inside. Promise.

The place was basically a mini science-center that had a bunch of plants and bugs and lizards and things. Basically, the kind of stuff I've seen countless times in various boy scout activities (both as a kid and an adult), but pretty fun nonetheless. And since we were in Asia, a lot of the critters were different: they had some enormous rhino beetles, scorpions, and the kids got to dig for...whatever the heck this thing is.

Funny thing is, I've been playing FF6 on the Nintendo DS, where you run into monsters that look like those pretty regularly. Thankfully, I didn't try to kill it for experience points. Also of interest was a little exhibit on silkworms, complete with a silkworm-spinning wheel. I have no idea if this thing was to scale.

Still, it was pretty neat! The kids had a good time. Had some lunch, complete with elf-endorsed Lipton tea. 

We soon headed back to the school- whereupon the kids watched a bootleg DVD of the first Narnia movie. Some of them kept saying it was 'too scary,'- even when it was in the boring first part. Go fig! Of course, that's looking at it from an adult's perspective, and not that of some little Korean kid.

Saturday night was a friend of mine's birthday, so I took it pretty easy up until then. We went to this place called Monkey Beach, which is a Thai-style dance bar that's popular with GI's.

To be honest, the joint was not exactly my scene. Too...well, I dunno if trendy is the right word, but eh. It was also a bit scuzzy- but not in the charming, dive sort of way. More as in...sticky floors. Ew.

It was THAT kind of joint. Though as intimidating as that sign makes it seem, I would hardly say it's a 'rough' joint at all. Really, my biggest complaint would be about the music; I'm just not a fan of dance-y hip hop (especially since most of the bars pretty much have the same playlist, it seems). I will admit there's one super-crunk Li'l John song that's kind of growing on me, but still.

The place did serve liquor by the bucket, so there's a silver lining, I guess? Regardless, we didn't spend the whole night there- we wound up stopping by a punk rock bar instead, and that was FAR more entertaining. We honestly didn't spend that long there, but it was ridiculously refreshing to hear some Rage Against the Machine after a night of hip hoppy dance music. I'm such a music nerd.

In any case, it was a fun night, even if I wound up staying out waaaaaaay too late. But again, I don't intend to make this a habit- or at least I plan on finding more interesting things to blog about.

Either way, stay tuned!

So I'm a little late in this entry- and that's just due to my own laziness. That, and I was afraid I didn't have too much to post about. Of course, once I had some time to think it over, more stuff came to mind. Hence, this!

In any case- work is work, not much to say there. Things are going pretty well- I've gotten to the point where I have half an idea of what I'm doing, so that's good. Earlier in the week, I went ahead and went up on the roof of my building during a nice day- and so, here's a bird's eye view of Ilsan!

Friday night, I hit up the local expat bar- only again, I happened to go there too early. My problem is that I get off of work, and then I'm ready to do cool stuff...but the bar doesn't really pick up 'til later in the evening. And since I get there when things are slow, I usually just have a beer or two and then meander back to my place around 10-ish.

It was kind of amusing, though, as on my way to the bar, I happened to pass by this big music hall/megachurch sort of thing- at which point I had some middle-aged ladies try to get me to go to Saturday's services. I can't fault them for their prolestyzing, as they were very polite- but at the same time, it's not quite my thing. I declined as politely as I could.

But! Then, on my way BACK from the bar, a few hours later, I stop by one of the street vendor's carts for a delicious snack. At which point a Korean guy there (who...might not have been entirely sober) starts chatting to me in English. And apparently, his wife was one of the ladies giving out pamphlets the next block over. And the guy kind of rambled on- inviting me to go hiking, and to the church service the next day. Quite friendly- if perhaps a bit overly so. And given the fact that I was more in the mood to head back to my apartment, a little awkward. So I pulled the old 'pretend you just got a cellphone call' trick, and used that to make my escape. Woo.

I proceeded to catch Splice as it was playing on one of the Korean channels (they play a lot of English-language movies with Korean subtitles). It's a crazy, somewhat twisted movie- but in a good way. It's a good thing when a flick can make you go 'dang, that's screwed up' without making you want to barf.

Saturday morning and afternoon was pretty uneventful. I strolled around Ilsan, and made a stop at the local library- however, I was unable to get a library card, as apparently you need a passport-sized photo to do it. I shouldn't have been surprised, as you need a photo to do much of anything here- to get a physical, to apply for a job, and probably a lot of other stuff that I don't even know about. I also found a nice little resturant where I had some really tasty shrimp & rice. I'd say more, but I'm kind of getting hungry just thinking about it right now.

Saturday night, though- that was the highlight. Once again, I went to Hongdae, which is right by a big University. Lots of young people, and lots of stuff for young people- bars, clothing shops, fast food, dance clubs, and more bars. Kinda like Austin, only with kimchi. And a LOT more cramped, obviously. It being Saturday night, there was all kinds of stuff going on- musicans busking, vendors hawking their stuff, and, of course, people drinking. Everywhere. Korea has no open container laws, so you can just pop into one of the city's ubiquitous convenience stores, nab a beer or a bottle of soju or whatever, and then just roll down the street. The highlight of the street-sights was probably coming across a freestyle rap battle in a little park. I'm assuming the guys had some mad (Korean) rhymes, as every now and again, the entire crowd would go "OOOOOOOOOH!" and I would assume someone just got told.

It took me like 45 minutes to find the venue I wanted to go to. And literally, as I was saying 'argh I hate everything I'm gonna go home!'...I found it. As in, I was standing right in front of it, and I'd prolly passed it like three times before. Oops.

Still, it worked out quite well, all things considered! The club was a tiny little basement- maaaaybe about two thirds of the size of the room at Cicero's, for any readers who might be familiar with it.

I got there just in time to drink a beer before the first act went on, so it's not like I missed anything. And I'm glad I didn't! The first band was a Korean ska band called Kingston Rudieska. Which is kind of like calling a punk band 'Detroit Punkrock.' Funny name aside, they were really good- they had a solid two-tone sound, with kind of poppy vocals. It was funny, too, as all the stage banter was in Korean. Still, most folks were having a pretty good time, so I'd say the band was doing their job.

After Kingston Rudieska was some indie-style band made of a bunch of Americans (they might've had a Canadian in there, too). They were alright, if not amazing.

Next act was a punk band called Whatever That Means, and I have to say I rather liked them. It also helped that they came on when the bar started giving out free drinks (crappy cocktails, mind, but the price was right!). And as an added bonus, they played some Slayer during the sound check, thus giving the audience (or at least me) free reign to yell "WOO. SLAYEEEEEEER!" Because someone's gotta do it. Or something. And they did a Misfits cover as their encore, which was pretty rad too. There was even a mosh pit going! Albiet one with only like six people in it. This one girl who was rocking really hard attempted a stage dive, but unfortunately it didn't quite work- she didn't fall on her face, thankfully, but it mostly came off as more of a 'stage step-down' than anything.

There was another Korean band that came on after that- but by that point, it was 1 am, so I decided to go get some fresh air. From what I saw, they were alright, though.

All and all, I'm quite glad I went to the show- seeing live music was one of my favorite things to do in St. Louis, and I'm really glad I can go ahead and do the same in Seoul. I'm excited for the chance to go out and about and see more indie music- right now, the RockTigers are high up on my list for bands to see- because Korean Rockabilly? That's ridiculously obscure enough that I pretty much HAVE to see it, just so I have a trump card when it comes to obscure band one-upmanship.

Anyway! That's not where the evening ended, either! As once I was done with the show, I ambled around a little more...and I decided I needed a break. So I found a PC Bang. 'Bang' means 'room' in Korean, see- and PC...is, well, PC. PC Bangs are places where, for like a dollar an hour, you can sit at a computer, play video games, surf the internet, or whatever. My original plan was to hang out in one of these for a few hours 'til the trains started again. Endurance, and all that.

I probably could have made it, too! But, my cousin called me up about an hour into my video game time- and once I informed her of my plan, she said 'don't do that, crash at my place!' Which, honestly, I have to admit was the better plan. So, I walked like two or three blocks over, at which point I met up with my cousin and her friends- and after a little more effort in getting a taxi (apparently, it's kind of hard to find one who'll take you to where you wanna go for an actual legal price), we made it back to her place! We briefly hung out on the roof (time enough for me to have another beer, at least), and then wrapped up the evening at, oh...four? Five AM? This is apparently about standard for partying in Seoul.

And the funny thing is? No hangover. A little sleep deprived, sure- but on the various late, late nights I've spent out and about, I haven't nearly been in as bad of shape as I thought I'd be in. Maybe I just know how to pace myself, or maybe it's 'cause I won't touch soju, or...something. I dunno!

Regardless, Sunday was my typical 'laze around' day- I headed back to my apartment, did some reading, watched some TV (Every episode of every Star Trek ever is on Youtube these days, so that's keeping me occupied) and otherwise was a bum. Being a bum is rather enjoyable, I might note.

So yeah. Just looking at another week of school- I think we're supposed to take a field trip to the zoo on Friday, which should be fun! Or possibly depressing, depending on how well they treat the animals. Regardless, I'll keep you posted.

Tanks for the memories!

You'll all be happy to hear that this has been a pretty good week. There's a variety of reasons for this, but I think a lot of it comes from the fact I've wrapped up my first full month of school at my Hagwon- most of the classes have a set amount of material for each month, so I now (theoretically) know what to do in April. Or at least I can avoid the big pitfalls I fell into before.

Also! One of the big highlights of my week was getting a care package from my folks in the states! The only problem with it was that I got it at school- so I got to spend most of the day staring at the box, wishing I could go home and open it up. Sweet, sweet anticipation.

But yes- cookies! Peanut butter! Taco seasonings! Books! Black tea! All sorts of goodies. I honestly haven't even touched the cookies and the like- saving 'em for later, y'see. Still, just having a little bit of home shipped over here made me feel pretty great.

And, on top of all that- I finally got my ARC card, which means I could finally get a bank account, which means I got PAID. Ah, it's a good feeling, knowing I have money coming in. I'm going to have to sit down and figure out my expenses soonish, but I plan on tucking a tidy sum of my earnings here away. Living thrifty and all that. (Which didn't stop me from buying a bunch of stuff at the grocery store just now, but still).

Friday night, I hit up the local expat bar- unfortunately, I got there a bit early, so it was kinda quiet. I had some fun talking to a Welshman & a Canadian- both of whom absolutely trounced me at darts- but they were very sporting about it, especially given the fact I didn't know how to play beyond 'throw the pointy thing at the round thing on the wall.'

Saturday was certainly more eventful, however! As once again, I met up with my cousin and a friend of hers- whereupon we went to the War memorial of Korea. Pretty neat little museum- the outside was easily the best part, as it had a ton of tanks, planes, helicopters, and other hardware from the Korean war. They even had a little destroyer (or whatever the name of this kind of ship is) you could walk around in- and you could see a bunch of holes in the side of it that'd been circled with red to indicate where it'd gotten shot up. In retrospect, I probably should've read the plaque, but I was a little too distracted by poking around.

The inside of the museum was neat too- though again, I couldn't help but find some of the exhibits kind of jingoistic. Which isn't to say that they do the same in the states, but there was a lot of 'Look at all this cool stuff our National Heroes of Korea use because they are so awesome!' The exhibit on the current ROK armed forces was particularly notable in this way. Which was kind of amusing, as I read in the newspaper a week or two ago that a lot of the Korean-made next-gen weapons the exhibits were touting...don't work like they should.

There was an exhibit/memorial on the sinking of the Cheonan. I found this surprising, since the whole North Korea issue is one of those things that nobody seems to mention in passing conversation- which made the exhibit a little more jarring. Especially considering they had pieces of the torpedo that sank the ship on display. It was like the entire point of the exhibit was to say 'LOOK WHAT THEY DID.'

So yeah, we poked around the museum for a bit, then headed back to my cousin's pad to regroup (and so she and her friend could change clothes. Whereas I, of course, stayed in my same T-shirt, fleece, & jeans I'd been wearing before. Then, we went to Hongdae! That's the neighborhood around a big university, so it's very young and trendy (and an expat hangout, to boot!). And, being Saturday night, it was pretty bustling. 

The ORIGINAL plan was to catch a punk rock show- but when we got to the club, there was a different band on the bill than the one we wanted to see. Which either meant I got the place wrong, or there's another joint with the same name, or whatever.

But that's alright! As if you can't find something fun to do in Hongdae, you probably hate fun in the first place. Bars and clubs were everywhere- we wound up going to some little place called 'Zen III.' They had a pretty good DJ (even if he began to repeat some of his songs. As good as it is, I think "I'm on a Boat" is a once-a-night kind of song). Some more of my cousin's friends popped in, so we wound up spending most of the night dancing around and generally having a good time. It was my first night partying Korean-style, and I have to say that while the club wasn't exactly my typical sort of haunt, I really enjoyed it. I had...more than a few Jack & cokes, so that helped too. Still, the cocktails must've been a bit weak, as when I woke up this morning, I didn't have the hangover that I feared I'd wind up with. Go figure! Maybe I just sweated most of the booze out on the dance floor. 

 

 

(I don't know who that guy is, but he had rad glasses, which is enough for a picture).

 

In any case, we eventually wound down- ambling out of the club, at which point we got schwarmas from a street vendor outside the club. They, of course, were delicious in the way that greasy, spicy food can be once you're winding down an evening's revelry. Certainly more characterful than Jack in the Box, at least!

We piled into a taxi, and my cousin was awesome enough to let me crash at her place, given I live a good hour away from Hongdae (or anything cool in Seoul). That, and the trains had stopped running by the time we wound down anyway. Got about...four hours of sleep before I woke up again, and made my way home! I dunno what it is, but I'm kind of an early riser these days. Residual jetlag, perhaps? Or maybe the sun was just shining in my eyes.

But yeah, a little bit of fatigue aside, I'm doing pretty good! Sundays are lazy days for me, which is a nice little routine- I went to the grocery store, cleaned on the apartment a little bit, took a nap, and so on. I'm sure I'll crash hard in a few hours and catch up on the sleep I missed, but that's just fine by me!