Well, the weather got warm for a week and then quickly plunged back to below freezing, which is rather annoying when I see that it’s 60-70 and beautiful in Philly. So, the weather has kept us from doing anything outdoorsy, but we’ve had some truly Korean experiences these past few weeks. We went to a Korean booking club, which you need to have a Korean friend to get into. This club is a lot different than a club in America. Here you pay a 15$ dollar cover and your group gets a huge plate of fruit, a bottle of crown royal, 6 beers, and a couple sodas. Another difference is that if you are at a table without any girls the host will see there are 5 guys at this table and find a table of 5 girls and bring them over to you when the DJ stops. Then you’ll talk until the DJ comes back on and then if things work out you will go dance. It’s really weird because when the DJ stops all the Koreans leave the dance floor. Of course, whenever we got on the dance floor everyone was in awe because they kind of lack rhythm, and are infatuated with white people.
The next day we went to a Hanok village, which is a recreation of a traditional Korean town. The cool thing about this one is it is in downtown Seoul, and you can see the Seoul tower over the fake houses. So we’re walking around and the place is filled with tons of tourists, and Alex gets up on a ledge to take a picture and we see these Koreans with these huge camera’s taking photos of her, which is whatever, but then I ask them to take a picture of us on my camera. Then they all just decide to take picture of us. It’s weird; kind of like being a celebrity. This also happened to use with one of Alex’s coworkers boyfriends. He said I looked like Paul McCartney and wanted to show his friends. It’s very rare to hang out with a Korean and not have them tell you that you look like someone famous, which never actually looks like you. My buddy Beau gets Brad Pitt, and my co-worker Joe gets Hugh Jackman all the time. Of course, this makes absolutely no sense. So the reason why I get Paul McCartney is because I haven’t shaved or cut my hair in quite some time. I just found out the Koreans in the town I live in call me the “One with the Hair.” That cracked me up when I found out. We also had an experience that really reminded me of home.
We took a booze cruise on the Han River, which cuts through downtown Seoul. It was pretty much a foreigner’s only party, which is really weird for a couple reasons. To go from being a head taller than everyone to being normal height was a shock. To actually be able to talk to everyone and have them understand me was a little weird because I’ve become used to saying anything in public because no one can understand me. Lastly, I still believe that most of the foreigners are really weird. But the cruise was only so-so because it was still really cold and then being on the water was even worse. We ended up staying inside for most of it and taking advantage of the open bar.
The only other thing that happened these past two weeks was I had to go to a seminar for this new program on a Saturday without getting paid, which was BS. We had gotten out of it a month ago, but decided it wasn’t worth fighting this time. Now because we didn’t go last time the entire staff had to come out and go to it again. Sucks for them, but work relationships have gone down the toilet lately, so I don’t really care. We get there after only getting 4 hours of sleep the night before and thank god Joe and I were put in another room for English speakers. So I don’t really remember this, but Joe tells me I took off my shoes and went to sleep for about an hour. Then we went up for the joint presentation, which was stupid because we have been running this program for about 3 weeks and knew how to use the program. Well, anyways this story is a boring, but once our boss and the Koreans left after lunch we waited about 5 minutes then left after them, and went to the casino.
This casino trip was definitely one of the more memorable trips. We sat down at the roulette wheel next to a South African, who had been sitting there for a couple hours and said he knew which dealers threw what numbers. Of course, we were thinking no way is that possible, but he said there was the 0 and 00 spinner. Sure enough out of 15 throws 5 were 0 or 00, and a couple numbers right around there. This was awesome because the drinks are free and you can get free meals there. After being there for four hours at this one wheel we had the pit boss talking about us asking the dealers to watch what numbers we were betting. It was pretty fun, and after not getting paid for working a Saturday; I ended up 300,000 Won. So it turned out to be a fun Saturday.
A few more things: Today I walked by a construction crew spray painting in a semi-enclosed area without masks on. This is the same culture that will wear a mask if they’re in public or move away from foreigners. Also here is a some picture of the “Yellow Dust” I have mentioned before.
