Pictures of my Apartment

Ice beers and staying up until Sunrise

For the past 5 weeks I have been felling great. Seemingly endless energy and the desire to not miss out on any fun situation that may present itself. However, on Thursday I got home form work and I began to fell a little under the weather. I did tno think much about but when I got up the next morning I felt absolutely awful.

Cultural Note: In Korea its always important to keep up your apperance and not appear weak.

Case in point even if you fell like shit unless you are can't get out of bed sick you are expected to work (in my contract it says I am allowed only small handful of sick days and if I use one I need a doctors note explaining and justifying my sickness, seems a little elementary schoolish doesn't it)

Regardless, I went to work and felt like crap all day but luckily it was a Friday which is my easy day where I only teach two 45 minute classes. I powered through the day and went home and passing out for the night almost immediately.

So, after losing a Friday night to sickness which was quite painful I awoke on Saturday morning to fell a little. My throat still hurt like hell but I wasn't cold and I didn't fell weak so that was an important noticeable improvement. I went to the pharmacy looking for some sort of painkilling spray for my throat but all they had were lifesaver looking drops which did little to help my situation. I began to fell better as the day went on and decided to go out downtown as long as I drank quite moderately not going overboard.

Here is how it went:

We started off by going to a sports bar which is mostly a Korean spot. We left rather quickly to a place called the Ice Bar which is exactly as it sounds. Its a pretty spacious and nice bar with quite comfortably seating (like most of Korea actually). For 3,500 won you get a large glass made out of ice which is placed in a small plastic casing so you have a handle on it. The fun thing about this place is not only will your beer always stay perfectly frosty when you finish your beer whats the only logical thing to go with it, I'll give you a hint they don't reuse them. The bartender gives you a glove and lets you throw your beer at a target area on the wall where if you hit it dead on it lights up the outside frame and similarly to the old game show called Press your Luck (Whammy!) and it goes around the frame eventually stooping on some prize (which is mostly more beer, although you can also win some sausages). However, I missed badly on my first attempt but my friend Chris was successful hitting the target but landed on the only Whammy! section which means no prize. The second round through I actually broke my ice glass by testing its strength to a hand squeeze, obviously not a smart decision seeing as its made of ice.

After we headed to another place called Who's Bob which is probably the bar I have been to most so far. Normally the place has alot of people but for some reason this Saturday its was absolutely packed with no room to even grab a table or a spot at the bar. However, I was not drinking that much so I decided to turn my attention to scoping out the situation of the bar. I noticed one of the most attractive foreigner girls I have seen so far, cute girl with dark hair and a great body. I decided I needed to make a move, especially after the previous weekends D.D. experience. I procrastinated on it for an hour or so until she approached me saying simply, "lets take a shot". I was in no mood to drink that much, even though at this point I was felling great and let alone buy her a drink but she was not expecting me to which was nice. I grabbed the bartender I knew (who hooked me up with a free shot the previous weekend) and we both took a shot of jagger than preceded to the dance floor. We danced for awhile although I think she was a little intimidated of my well documented and known dancing skills and we ended up taking another shot however right after finishing them her dude friend approached me and told me she has a boyfriend and that she was a massive cock-tease. Now I was not happy to hear this so I just bounced out and started hanging out with my friends again and we left the place soon after.

We went to one more bar, although I was done drinking at this point felling buzzed but not wanting to test my bodies limit after just being sick. We meet up with our friends Mitch and Margo who just got back from a weeding who themselves felt quite tipsy. Whille at Go Go Vinyl I meet up with this guy Andrew who I met the previous week at Who's Bob. Hes a cool guy and introduced me to one of the funniest guys I have met in Daegu named Stewart. Stewart is a hilarious Scotsman who at one point was fed up with my buddy Eben using the word money as an adjective descrbing things and started giving him shit for whille we were walking on the streets, telling all the Koreans how 'money' Eben was. The night after that was not that eventful but we did not get home until right before sunrise at around 6am. I woke up the next morning felling surprising perfect and with no sore throat. So, I guess fate was telling me that the cure to a sore throat is moderate drinking I suppose...

Chuseok

In Korea Chuseok is the biggest holiday of the year, think of Christmas combined with Thanksgiving. It's a three day celebration so I was excited to have a few days off to relax. Unfortunately, this Chuseok was on Friday, Saturday and Sunday which means I only got one additional day off of work. My brother headed down from Suwon to visit me in Daegu so we could have are own thanksgiving celebration.

Thursday:

-I was planing on relaxing at the house and not go out drinking on Thursday night however it was one of my friends birthdays, Lauren, so Eben and I headed downtown from Soo-Sung-gu. It was a fun eventful night just playing foosball and drinking at the bar Who's Bob, especially watching the antics of few amazing entertain people. Lets just call these people Thunder Thighs and Jesus. I drank a few beers and started talking to some random foreigner from the States. I continued to drink and hang out with my friends until we decided it was time for a change of scenery leaving for a pretty cool bar whos name escapes me right now. Anyway it was not crowded there but the bartender would put on any song you wanted and was rather friendly and hooked me up with a free shot of jagger. The girl from the other bar who I meet came along with use and lets just call her D.D. So, I am felling rather buzzed at this point and decided I need to put on the A-Game and hit on this girl. She is felling it so we bounce on our buddies and we head to some random but amazing Korean (not foreigner) club that I had not been to before being lead there by a group of random korean babes. We dance there for awhile and then we head back to D.D.'s place which just so happened to be a 5-10 minute walk from Rodeo street (downtown). I spare everyone the details but lets just say I wake up with a massive hangover at 12pm and begin to regret my drunk decision for several reasons the first being blue balls and the second I found her rather annoying which latter uncovering she is a sorority girl so I'm not that surprised. Luckily she does not have a phone so I just bounce and realize my brother is supposed to be getting in to Daegu any minute now...

Friday:

My brother and I meet up outside of Donga department store which is the largest 'road-sign' near my apartment. David and I just relax all day walking around the city and I took him to my favorite sam-gip-sal restaurant (korean BBQ). When night comes around all my friends decide to go to the university area but david and I are already downtown so we just do the solo mission. We start off at this all korean sports bar and then he tells me he wants to go to a club so I take him to the largest one in Daegu called Club Frog. It was ridiculously packed with foreigners, mainly military guys who that night were pissing me off to no avail. Who ends up walking into the club right when were on our way out but the girl from last night D.D. I really did not want to run into at this point so we exchanged pleasantries and we quickly left. After some soju David and I went back to the club to get Davids jacket before we headed back to my apartment. After an eventful trip back to my apartment to say the least we passed out for the night.

Saturday:

I woke up felling refreshed for Chuseok day after an interesting past two night. David and I spend the day relaxing watching Korean Trot (horrible Korean Karaoke) which is extremely popular on Chuseok and walking around town. That night we decide to have a group dinner at my buddy Eben house where we cooked good pasta and burritos (thank god I brought tortillas from the states). Chris, Eben my brother and myself all decided to then go downtown and I honestly don't have a good memory for the proceedings that occurred there. I do remember waking up and my apartment was a mess with a disturbing smell. I said a happy and sad goodbye to my brother and I cleaned up my place and just relaxed after a long yet amazing 2 day weekend. For everyones information my house is back in order after a couple hours of cleaning and that smell is gone thank god.