Busan: No Reservations

Hi everyone! Last week my friends and I decided we wanted to go to Busan. We decided we would just wing it - with the exception of our train tickets to Busan we were not going to make any reservations - Anthony Bourdain style. We didn't book a hotel or plan anything out for the weekend. I went to Busan with Sara, Rebecca, and David - all from Wisco- and then met another friend down there. We had some trouble reserving our tickets for the train initially, but thanks to Rebecca becoming a Korail member we will never have trouble booking tickets again. We all met at Seoul Station around 7 to get some dinner - McDonalds of course. Then we spent the rest of the time making sure we had everything in order, namely reading material and alcohol for the train ride. Our train didn't leave until 9pm so we were there in plenty of time. We hopped on the train with our boxes (yes boxes!!!) of soju in hand and prepared for our 2 1/2 hour ride on the KTX bullet train to Busan.

Waiting for the train on the platform with 2 boxes of soju to get me through the train ride

Travel buddies Megan and Patrick

Me and Rebecca on the train

The train ride there went by very quickly. We arrived into Busan just before midnight and the first thing we noticed was that even though it was the middle of the night it was significantly warmer than Seoul. We hopped in a cab once we got off the train and went to Haeundae Beach - the area in Busan we were staying. Busan is located on the southeast coast of South Korea and most of the action is around the beaches. Busan is sort of the Miami of South Korea - although its not warm all year round, it does have more mild weather and has better weather than Seoul. We had the cab drop us off where we estimated a good place to be to find a love motel - super sleezy places intended for Korean businessmen to take their mistresses but a travelers dream because it has all the amenities of a hotel but not nearly as expensive. We decided on a pink hotel lit up with neon signs. Can never go wrong with a pink hotel. It ended up having a room available and so we booked it for 2 nights and went to our room. The room was pretty big - a king size bed perfect for us girls and had a couch we made David sleep on. Only issue was that the shower/whirlpool had a door, but the wall of the bathroom was a huge window looking out into the rest of the hotel room. Awkward. Overall though it was one of the nicer love motels I've stayed in, but just to remind us what the room is really intended for we had a condom vending machine at the door:

A condom dispenser with an AIDS lollipop. Um?!

After putting our stuff down we decided to explore the area - it was close to 1am by this point but things are open pretty much all night in Korea so we had no trouble finding things to do. We walked down by the beach and ran into the PIFF pavilion. Busan just finished hosting the Busan (Pusan) International Film Festival. Josh Hartnett was in town for the event and it was a huge deal for the film festival to draw in such a big name American actor. The beach was amazing even at night - it was full of people sitting around and drinking or just hanging out.

Me, Sara, and Rebecca on the beach

Haeundae Beach, Busan

We walked around on the boardwalk and ran into a little area with coin-operated bumper cars. So dangerous. I have no idea why they think its a good idea to have those readily available for whoever might stumble past but we definitely took advantage of the situation. All you have to do is put in a 500won coin and the music on the little cars start playing and you can just bump into whoever else is driving around. So fun.

We went back to our hotel around 3 or so, but the boys decided to hit up the casino. The next morning we woke up pretty late - our room didn't have windows so it was totally dark and we just kept on sleeping thinking it was the middle of the night still. We all took showers with limited lighting since we didn't want to give a free show to the other people in the room. So there I am showering away when A HUGE FREAKING SPIDER pops out of nowhere and is hanging out in the shower with me. Now, I know people probably think I'm exaggerating when I say that this spider was huge, but for once I'm not. This was a fat juicy hairy black spider. I didn't know what to do. So there I am in the in the see-through shower while I'm being held hostage by a giant spider blocking the exit. Terrifying. Naturally, I started screaming at the top of my lungs and having no other defense against the spider, I unhooked the detachable shower head and used it as a high pressure water gun to shoot the sucker to the other side of the shower so I could grab a towel and run for it. I ran out of the bathroom and sent in someone to kill it. I could hear the crunch it made as it was smushed. Absolutely disgusting. I steered clear of the bathroom as much as possible from that point on.

Once the spider drama was over, the 5 of us went to a burger place near the beach (my first since I arrived in Korea!) and had some lunch. After that we went to the beach and layed out for a few hours. The water was freezing and it was even a little chilly to be laying out in swim suits, so we just sat on the beach in our clothes but when the sun came out it was soooo nice. Here's some pics from the beach:

In front of the "independent filmmakers lounge" from the PIFF

On the beach!

Haeundae Beach, Busan

Eventually the boys decided to go back to the casino to try to "win their money back" from the night before, and us girls decided to give the Busan seafood a try. Now, I've never really liked seafood very much, but I decided to be a good sport about it because I've been all about trying new things since I got here. Busan is supposed to have really good seafood so I figured this would be the place to give it a go. We found a place that had several people sitting outside which is always a good sign. Our choice? Fresh clams. They were fresh out of the tank, and cooked right in front of us. We really didn't have a clue how to eat them. The other girls enjoyed them, but I wasn't a big fan. Ah well. I tried.

Dinner...

Clams!

Crabs!

View from the restaurant

How do we eat this?!

After dinner we stopped at Starbucks to pick up some cheesecake, and then bought some wine and beer for the night. We made a quick pit stop at our hotel to drop some things off and pick up others. We met up with the boys and then hopped in a taxi to Gwangali Beach. Once a year there is a huge fireworks show at Gwangali Beach in Busan and people from all over Korea come here to enjoy the show. Everyone brings blankets and sits on beach eating and drinking and watches as the fireworks are lit off the Rainbow Bridge. I have seen a lot of things and been a lot of places and I have to say - this is one of my favorite things I have seen or done. The whole atmosphere was amazing. Sitting on a beach on the edge of a huge city surrounded by mountains watching fireworks.

We arrived about 2 hours before the show was schedule to begin, and it would have done us good to get there even earlier. We managed to find a spot on the crowded beach to put our stuff down. We passed the time by lighting sparklers which entertained a lot of the children around us. The fireworks show was the best I have ever seen - every second was like a grand finale, combined with the lights display from the bridge. All of the high rise hotels and apartments shut off their neon lights to make the beach darker, and at some points we weren't even watching the fireworks in front of us. We would turn around and watch the buildings sparkle from the reflection of the fireworks. The show was set to music of course, blared over several loud speakers set up throughout the beach. Throughout the show we ate our cheesecake and drank our beer and wine.

Playing with sparklers on the beach :)

Gwangali Beach

Rainbow Bridge

Waiting for the show to begin

Fireworks!

The show lasted about 45 minutes and once it was finished we shoved our way through the masses of people and found a small carnival that had been set up on the beach. Rebecca and I decided to take a chance on a ride called "Crazy Flip". It pretty much just spun us upside down a bunch of times. Nothing too crazy but still fun.

After the carnival we walked through the fish market where you can choose your own live fish. Here's a bit of what we saw...

Fishies

Eels

Of course, what's a fish market without some live octopus (octopi?)

We stopped at a traditional Korean restaurant near the beach and had a quick meal. We went to a bar for a drink, and then headed back to Haeundae where we made lots of new friends and hung out until the wee hours of the morning, as usual.

Experimenting with our Asian style :)

Checked out of the love motel around noon and went to Starbucks on the beach. We spent an hour or two on the beach before hopping in a cab back to Busan Station where we were lucky enough to catch the next KTX to Seoul. Grabbed dinner at Seoul Station once we were back and then headed home. I highly highly recommend Busan for anyone to decides to come to Korea, it was definitely worth the trip and we will be going back again once the winter is over for some more fun in the sun. So that's all for now - I need to try to get the sand out of my hair, shoes, iPod, etc. Hiking Monday, Everland (amusement park) Tuesday, no classes Wednesday (still have to go to school but no teaching necessary). I'll get paid to watch movies and skype with all of you! I hate to brag - but I really do have the best job ever. I have yet to take a vacation day but out of the past 20 possible days for me to teach - I have taught 8. Life is good :)

Film Festival!

I'm on the beach and you're not. Ha ha!

"I dig my toes into the sand. The ocean looks like a thousand diamonds strewn across a blue blanket. I lean against the wind, pretend that I am weightless. And in this moment I am happy." --Incubus

Hongdae-ing Around

Hello again! So once again I'm not really sure where to start. Every week here is something new and different. Yet at the same time, some of the things that I used to find so strange are suddenly just part of my everyday life and have become normal. I'm not sure when the switch flipped, but somewhere in the past few weeks this foreign country has stopped being so foreign and has started to actually feel like home. Believe me there is no better feeling than walking into your apartment at 7am after a long night out in Hongdae (the University area in Seoul my friends and I frequent on the weekends) and actually feeling at home in this apartment in the middle of Korea. I admit, it took me longer to feel at ease here than any other place that I've ever lived, but now I feel sort of guilty because I'm starting to forget what is "normal" here is not normal to everyone back home and that you all still may want to hear about it. Don't worry though, K-Pop still isn't normal to me and I still think its hilarious. More on that later.

Current mood: Disappointed in those Badgers, but also feeling incredibly smug that its snowing for all you losers in Wisconsin. Sucks to be you. It was 70 here today.

Also, they say a picture is worth a thousand words, right? Well this entry will be fullllll of pictures if that's ok. It really just describes everything better than I could ever attempt to.

This past Friday at school was "field day" or in my mind just plain ol' GAME DAY! No classes. No teaching. Just an entire day filled with games It was grrrreeat. All the homerooms competed against each other. Started off with some crazy human bridge game that involves one student running across the backs of the other students, and then the students have to run to the end of the line to allow the standing person to continue. They had to make down the soccer field and back. Really dangerous. Really funny.

Bridge Game

Here's a video of some of the students cheering. No idea what they're saying, but this class won for the most spirited of the day!

There was also a jump roping competition. This class happens to be my neighbor Sang-Eun's homeroom class. They won. And just FYI - they counted to 21 in the video before they messed up.

The kids were all really into all of the competitions and it was cool to see them so excited about something. Some of the homerooms even had shirts made to show their team spirit. The kids loved it because they usually have to wear uniforms and this was one of the rare days when they could dress as crazy as they wanted. One of my students, Garam, has surprised me by having some incredible photography skills. I've stolen a few of her pics to share with you all, because they're so good.

Also, my neighbor Sang-Eun roped me into participating in the days events because her homeroom is only boys. I may have said this before, but there is a disproportionate number of boys and girls at my school, and on average in a class of 30, there are only 5-10 girls. For the relay races, there needed to be 4 boys and 2 girls on each team. So she was going to be running with her kids, and asked if I would help out their team. The kids totally loved this. The first was a simple relay race, just run fast and pass it on. We didn't win, but the kids thought watching me run was fun and they were surprised by how "fast" I was. Which is really funny because I'm not fast at all - I think women here are just overly girly and don't tend to exercise much.

Sang-Eun's homeroom (my relay team)

The 2nd relay was not so simple and now the students have ammunition to make fun of me forever. For my part, I had to run, crawl in the dirt under a volleyball net, run some more, and then hop for what felt like forever in a potato sack. We all looked crazy but we were playing for playground pride here! Luckily I didn't have to do the 2nd part of the relay which involved some sort of somersault followed by sticking your face in a tray full of flour to grab a piece of candy. And here's some more pics from the day...

Friday night after game day I met up with Sara, Anna, and Rebecca in Seoul for a good old fashioned girls night out. We went out for dinner and then hit the clubs! We made a few Korean friends along the way as well which was fun. The club we went to was pretty insane. Think London meets Acapulco. The music was mostly hip hop which is perfect for me, but they were digging wayyyy back into the music archives. I'm pretty sure I heard TLC's No Scrubs at some point during the night. I also feel like we were all doing the Cupid Shuffle at some point as well (Courtney and Meghan please tell me you know this dance and can demo it for mom and dad because I know they don't have a clue what it is).

The huuuuge dance club

After the club we made our usual stop at Burger King and then hopped on the subway home.

This weekend I also went to Gyeongbokgung Palace. Its the biggest palace in Seoul, and was built in...1396? ish? Maybe? I can't remember honestly. But it was pretty awesome.

I also took a video since my pictures really don't show how massive this place is. Even the video doesn't quite capture the magnitude of it.

Inside the palace walls were pond, gardens, trees, multiple buildings, and a towering pagoda. It was pretty awesome. It also is especially beautiful because there are mountains visible behind the grounds of the palace. We were there in late afternoon and it was the perfect fall day.

After the palace, we walked around the City Hall area and Cheonggyecheon stream. Always great places to visit in Seoul. Then we got a brilliant idea to go up in the Samsung Jongno tower. This tower was the one I described wayyy back in August when I first ventured into Seoul - it was literally the first thing I ever saw in Seoul. So without really knowing whether or not we could go there, Sara, Rebecca and I decided to just go for it. We went up to the top floor, which is 33 for this particular building. At the top was an amazing view and an absolutely beautiful restaurant. They were really nice and allowed us to go in so we could take pictures, but we were so captivated by the view that we decided to stay and have a glass of wine at the top of this beautiful building to watch the sun set over the mountains. The pictures obviously don't measure up to how amazing it actually was, so for those of you who come to visit I'm going to highly recommend a sunset dinner or drink at this restaurant, appropriately named Top Cloud.

We decided to make reservations here for November when we'll be celebrating Sara, Rebecca, and Anna's birthday all in the same weekend - so I'm looking forward to going back.

Next weekend I'm planning to go to Busan with the usual crew to see a fireworks festival! Last weekend Busan hosted an international film festival and I think I saw on the news that Josh Hartnett was in Korea for it. He's such a babe. Its my first real weekend traveling out of Seoul - unless you count the DMZ but I don't really since I practically live next to it. If all goes as planned we will be taking the bullet train out of Seoul on Friday night, and it will take us about 3 hours on this high speed train across the country. We're still looking into hostels/love motels but we really want to stay near the beach. Its nice enough here still where even if we can't lay out or go in the water, it will be comfortable to at least walk around or play some games on the beach.

As promised, here is your weekly dose of K-Pop. This song always seems to be on in the grocery store near my house, and once I hear it I can't stop singing it. Limited English, as usual. "Sorry sorry" and "shawty shawty" is about it. The song is called Sorry Sorry by Super Junior. Super Junior has 13 members with ages ranging from 15-18. And is it just me or do they all have the same haircut? With the exception of the tutting part, the dancing in this video is so atrocious that I had the whole thing down by the time I had watched half of it. They literally just do the same moves over and over and occasionally reverse them. Having an obnoxious amount of people in k-pop bands is pretty common here. I have no idea who thinks that is a good idea but somehow they make it work. Completely ridiculous. But awesome. Here it is: Sorry Sorry by Super Junior.

School is going well. The kids are still continuing to amuse and frustrate me but its always entertaining. I'm looking into volunteer opportunities with several North Korean Human Rights organizations in Seoul. I'm working on getting my friends involved as well. Human rights is something I became really interested in during college and took several classes on. Its something that is a really important cause to me so I'm looking forward to getting involved and hopefully working on building a resume that is directed more pointedly at what I want to do with my life. Especially after visiting the DMZ and stepping into North Korea, I am even more dedicated to this particular cause. North Korea is guilty of some of the worst human rights violations in the world, and I want to help raise awareness and do whatever I can to help victims of this incredibly oppressive government. This is a link from Amnesty International about only one area of the many North Korea is guilty of violating. Please read it.

I'll be back next weekend with updates from (hopefully) Busan.

"It's my life, and I'm not sitting on the sidelines watching it pass me by. I'm leaving you my legacy. I gotta make my mark, I gotta run it hard, I want you to remember me. I'm leaving my fingerprints..." --Katy Perry

Every Wanna Pretty

Hello again! Quick shout out to my friend Nicole who just got engaged this past weekend. Congrats Nicki and Jens...I'm excited for you both :) But please no getting married until I'm back in the states!

Is it ok if I give another (and maybe even bigger) shout out to Wisconsin for WINNING against Minnesota and keeping the axe for another year. I was nervous and also fell asleep before the game ended at 4am, but don't worry...a few true fans stayed awake for the entire time over here.

Dedicated Badger fans...thanks ESPN for streaming overseas :)

Shortly after my last blog post, I received a message from my co-teacher, Jin, telling me that the father of one of the teachers at my school had passed away. I was supposed to go to the funeral. Surprisingly it wasn't entirely different from what I know of funerals in the U.S. The women were in black hanbok (traditional Korean dress), and the men had bands around their arm to signify they were family. Mostly it was just a lot of eating and drinking. Sitting on the floor Korean-style of course. There were a few differences, but nothing entirely notable so I'll save it for another day.

I'm nearing the end of my little vacation from school, and its been pretty good. Tuesday-Thursday of this past week I was in Osan City with my fellow Badgers and all the other GEPIK teachers. I was hoping to meet some cool people in my area, since most of my friends live south of Seoul, and I'm north, but everyone was pretty much off-their-rocker crazy. I'd like to know what's really going on with them. Like old greasy men that I just don't really get why they're here. Overall the "orientation and training" was completely useless but it did give us a chance to miss school for a few days so now that its over, it really wasn't so bad. We spent most of our nights teaching all the other people how to have a good time, so at one point we began a game of Flip Cup, Wisconsin vs The Rest of the World (and by the rest of the world, we meant everyone else in America and then...well the rest of the world). We did, admittedly, have to brush ourselves off once or twice, but overall we completely dominated and I think we proved that Badgers may just be...the best drinkers in the world!

After that, it was out at our usual spot in Hongdae for a typical party til the sun comes up kind of night. We did have to take a short cat nap in a Burger King, but please don't be alarmed, the chairs were comfy and everyone else was doing it. Such a bizarre culture, but its sort of acceptable to sleep anywhere over here.

This weekend was Chuseok. Its sort of the Thanksgiving of Korea. Its probably the biggest holiday here, so everything shuts down and even crazy busy Seoul becomes deserted because everyone goes to their hometowns for the weekend. Because of this holiday I was given Friday off of school and Monday. On Saturday, a group of us went to the Korean Folk Village in Yongin, near where Anna lives.

Pokemon!

사랑해요 (sarang hae yo) = I Love You!

Rebecca, me, Isabelle, Sara

We saw a few shows, traditional houses, precious little kids dressed up in hanbok (한복) and ate some yummy Korean food.

Little girl in a 한복 on a swing

Rebecca, me, Sara, and Isabelle in our "traditional" clothes.

Tightrope walker

Overall, it wasn't entirely authentic because its pretty commercialized, but some parts of it were worth seeing. Others I wouldn't recommend, but either way I'm glad I saw it. On Chuseok, you are supposed to "pray your wishes" to the full moon, and so we all wrote our prayers and wishes on little pieces of paper and tied them to this big...rock? or something, and hopefully they will come true :)

Praying my wishes..

Also visited the World Cup Stadium this weekend with Sara and Rebecca.

We were unable to get into the actual stadium but may look into a tour for another day. The stadium was really nice though and has a beautiful view of the mountains. The stadium was opened in 2001 and was built for the 2002 FIFA World Cup. Now its home to the FC Seoul team, and I read somewhere that it can hold over 65,000 fans. Leland, you said you read this thing sometimes right? Why don't you come play soccer over here? You don't even need to learn Korean!

FC Seoul

And finally, as promised, I will leave you all with some K-Pop songs. A favorite among my friends and me is a song called Pretty Girl by KARA. Part of the chorus goes like this: "If you wanna pretty, every wanna pretty.." and then goes into Korean that no one can understand. We are all incredibly confused because we don't know how anyone can want to pretty. Maybe they mean if you want to BE pretty? Or if you want a pretty girl? I don't know. But its hilarious and kind of catchy. I may need to teach my high schoolers, however, that its not really possible to "wanna pretty". Another favorite that is incredibly catchy is called 가라 가라 (Gara Gara) by the group Big Bang. G-Dragon (remember the cute blonde from a few posts ago?) was formerly a member of this band. See if you can pick out which one he is with the group. Hint: he's not blonde yet at this point. Click here to watch!

I think that's all for now. Currently deliberating on what to be for Halloween. They don't celebrate here, but we figure there's enough of us Wisco kids here who are notorious for throwing the best Halloween parties ever. Plus - there should be plenty of Americans between all the other English teachers in this country and the military guys running around. Costume ideas so far include : stealing outfits from our students and being Korean schoolgirls, 2NE1 (another huge K-Pop girl band over here), Girls Generation (K-Pop band with about 13 members), annddd that's about all. Any suggestions?

"We live in a wonderful world that is full of beauty, charm, and adventure. There is no end to the adventures we can have if we only seek them with our eyes open." --Jawaharial Nehru