A Sea of Red Devils (Part 1)

I'm back! Well, actually I've been back from Korea for a few days now but I'm too exhausted to do anything. Jeff, Sean, Tim, Ann, Emily and I left early for Narita Airport on Saturday morning for our 2.5 hr flight to Seoul. Travel days suck. Anyway, here goes...

Day 1

Our flight was delayed for an hour, which is always nice, so we didn't reach Seoul till around 5ish? Anyway, we debated a bit on how much money to exchange at Incheon Airport (which is hella nice, btw) so when we came out of the arrival gate, we saw that our tour group had been waiting for us. Oops. We got on this cute mini-ghetto-ish bus that took us to our hotel. On the ride there, our tour guide said many things in Japanese, most of which I didn't understand. Anyway, it's strange b/c at the airport, Emily noticed an ad w/ "Sam Soon" on a luggage cart. And while we were on the bus, I saw an add w/ "Henry" on another bus that was passing by. (Sorry to those who haven't watched Sam Soon and have no idea what I'm talking about. GO AND WATCH IT NOW!) We ended up seeing like 10,000 ads w/ "Henry" throughout our trip. He is HOT.

Seoul sorta reminds me of a cross b/w Hong Kong, Bangkok and America. Well, and every other Asian country you can think of. Thing is, they have Papa John's, Burger King, Chili's, etc. so I really felt like I was back at home. Anyway, everything in Korea is big. I mean, big. Like, their cars seem bigger to me and the roads are much much wider. And, oh yeah, Koreans are ASIAN GIANTS! Seriously! Both the men and women are soo big and tall!! I've never been in an Asian country where I felt soo short! Korean men are HOT HOT, as they are tall, BUFF (yes, BUFF!) and have nice clean faces. Korean women are also tall and they have meat (in a good way), unlike most stick-thin Asian women. Go Koreans! We all think they're so big and tall b/c of all the meat they eat. Seriously, yakiniku (Korean BBQ) is like a staple in the country. I wonder how many pounds of red meat Koreans consume per day. Hmm. Oh yeah, and I wonder how many bottles of shochu they drink per day! Seriously, all we could see were loads and loads of green bottles at every restaurant we passed. I hope they recycle.

The pollution in Seoul doesn't seem as bad as it is in Tokyo, but feels like a big city, nonetheless. Anyhoo, our tour bus took us to a duty-free shop before taking us to the hotel. This is what Asian tour packages do to get commission from the places they take us to. We weren't interested in buying anything since we'd only been in Seoul for like 5 minutes. After our drop off at the hotel, we were free to do whatevas we wanted till the morning of our flight back.

Our hotel was a lot better than expected. Remember how I said things in Korea are big? Well, there's no exception to that when it comes to TVs. Even though our hotel wasn't the nicest, we had the biggest TVs in our rooms! It was strange, but cool. After we dropped off our stuff at the hotel, we headed out for dinner. The cool thing about Seoul is that they have tons of street stands and the food is cheap cheap. That's one thing that's missing in Japan. Sad. We opted for a busy-looking-outdoor/indoor yakiniku place. I swear we each had 10lbs of meat. It was yummy though. I especially love the fact that Korea offers free banchan (appetizers) for every meal and they keep replacing them for you! We felt bleh afterward b/c of all the meat, but some of us still had room to try some ice cream? Haha.

Oh yeah, Korean conbini review. Sadly, Korean conbinis suck. They cannot compete w/ the variety, orderliness?, and size of Japanese ones. It seems like their conbinis are more of a place to get your neccessities rather than being the dessert oases known as Japanese conbinis.

What does one do on their first night Seoul? Watch X-Men 3, of course. I'm not kidding. Because X-Men 3 has come out in EVERY country except for Japan, we decided to watch it in Korea. Buying the ticket was actually pretty hilarious. The guy behind the counter must've thought we were retarded. We seriously used every hand gesture imaginable and spoke like retards in English to purchase our tickets. We really did look like idiots. Nice. Btw, X-Men 3 SUCKS! Yes, don't bother wasting your money. I could've written a better dialogue and I swear the director has ADD. A big disappointment since X2 was soo good.

Day 2

Em, Sean, Tim and Ann had to wake up early the next morning to go on their tour of the DMZ...border b/w North and South Korea. Jeff and I decided we weren't too interested as we heard there's not much to look at, plus we didn't want to pay for it. Hehe. Anyway, instead of the DMZ, Jeff and I went shopping. Woot. We first hit Namdaemun Market, which reminds me of the markets in China, Thailand, etc. The difference is that in Korea, the vendors don't really care to bargain, so it's not as fun to do so. If they give you a price and you don't like it, you can make a lower offer, but if they don't accept, it's not like they're gonna try to persuade you to buy. They just don't care enough to. I guess that makes things simple. Anyway, we each bought a Korea World Cup jersey which were being sold in every city block of Seoul...really. They look cool.

Next we hit Myeong Dong. It's supposed to be the trendy shopping area of Seoul. I liked that area a lot. I think that Japanese fashion is more "out there" than Korean fashion tho, thus making Japanese fashion a bit more exciting. Don't get me wrong; the Koreans love their colors as well, but it's hard to beat the crazy fashion you see in Tokyo. Moving on. We had lunch in a small canteen-like place on a side street and ordered enough food for 4 people. We wanted to try everything. It was oishiiyo! We also made some cool purchases in that area. One of which is the Rain (Korean singer/actor...btw, I stole this link thru Jeff's blog...thanks...hehe) Live in Concert DVD!! Woot!! He looks sooo hot on the cover! We were gutted b/c we didn't have a DVD player in our room. Bahh. I need to watch it NOW!

Shopping and walking all day made us so tired; we went back to our hotel room to take a nap! Haha. We met up with the others back at the hotel and headed for dinner together. This time, we hit the street stands. It was oishiiyo and it only cost us $2 each...for an entire dinner! Woot. After dinner, we cabbed it to Itaewon, the gaijin (foreigner) area of Seoul. The ride was a lot farther than expected, but it didn't matter, as taxis in Korea are hella cheap! We ended up cabbing it wherever we went from that point on. Haha. Anyway, Itaewon is gross. Stupid foreigners. ;-)

We headed for this one bar we had a flyer for which was showing the World Cup Japan vs. Croatia game that night. When we got there, all we could see were tons of Nihonjin (Japanese peeps) in their blue jerseys. The place was packed packed. We went around searching for another venue and ended up at this yakiniku place. Yes, more meat. It was good tho but the game was lame!! Both teams played like crap and seemed to strive for mediocrity. The result: 0-0. Ugh. At least they didn't lose I guess. I guess. Next game they have to play Brazil. Good luck.

The Koreans were already up and sporting their red jerseys as the Korea vs. France game was gonna be played at 4am that morning! Yeah, I cannot express just how proud and supportive Korean fans are. Like, I swear no Korean slept that night to watch the match. Back at our hotel, every other channel was focused on the World Cup. Near 2am (right before I fell asleep), I saw on Korean TV that thousands upon thousands of fans in red gathered at the Seoul City Hall Plaza, cheering and preparing to watch the game at 4am. Clazy, indeed. I think the paper said that some students wore red jerseys over their school uniforms so that they could participate, watch the game, then go straight to school the next morning! Whoa, that's dedication right there, folks.

Match Result: Korea 1 - France 1. The next day, every channel was replaying the goal that Korea made in the 81st minute. Dude.