I had breakfast as usual on Saturday morning, and after allowing myself enough time to digest, I changed into my exercise clothes and took a jog. I went all the way over to Gwanan Beach, a distance of 7 km one-way. I took a short cut on the way back meaning the entire distance was only 13 km. Actually, at the end, I was running up and down the street in front of the hostel to get me from 12.8 km to an even 13. It is a good running course for the most part with only one stop light to worry about and pretty much always next to the water.
Back at the hostel, I was drinking water and chatting with the weekend worker when a guest came in. She had stayed in a different part of town but didn’t feel comfortable out and about at night, so she was considering moving over here for the night. She asked if there would be any events going on that night, and the employee, whom I will call Yeon, answered that he was having friends over to the hostel for a little party.
I, on the other hand, actually had some plans. My college classmate (I have quite a few of them), well technically my shimei (little sister), was going to meet me for dinner after work. She forwarded me a link to a restaurant near in my area and I had a bit of sticker shock at the price list. 60-70 dollars for 100g of beef on the barbecue. Yikes.
I met her at the subway station, and despite my hopes to practice a little Korean, we stuck to Chinese, our usual lingua franca. I was struck by how rusty my spoken Chinese was (so I guess I wasn’t fluently chatting in pure Chinese the other night). We didn’t go for the insanely priced beef, ordering a mountain of pork belly instead and had a feast of a dinner. She picked up the tab, but I was able to get the Starbucks afterwards. I managed to get some positive feedback on my weeks of Korean studying by showing off some knowledge of vocabulary words.
I walked her to the bus station so she could go home (her parent’s home, technically in the next city over), then walked back to the hostel. The previously mentioned party was in “full swing,” a few people hanging around the kitchen island drinking beer and wine out of a box (equivalent to 7 bottles). An invitation to join was accepted.
There were three Korean men, one of whom was a sports model, but they were constantly coming and going–presumably to smoke–and there was one girl. She was very pretty. I had noticed her in the morning and wanted to say hi, but was too shy. It turns out she was Japanese and spoke good English. Two Korean girls joined they party and I was fairly overwhelmed by the beauty on display. I couldn’t believe all three of them were between 20 and 22 years old. I wish I was as young as I look.
There was a Japanese couple — on their honeymoon — somewhat party adjacent and two other Japanese girls were brought on board shifting the balance from Korean to Japanese (though everyone seemed to be fairly fluent in Korean). I could recall enough Japanese to say “I’m American,” “I don’t understand Japanese,” and “are you okay?” It’s completely unfair how I’m trying to approach Korean with a laser focus, but I’m constantly being present opportunities to converse in Spanish, German, or Japanese. One language at a time.
I didn’t speak much and mostly just tried to pick up as much of the conversations as I could. A Brazilian guy who was craving a friend came over and was relieved to find I could speak English. We talked for a bit, all the while I was thinking how much I’d rather he go away so I could keep practicing my listening. It didn’t matter much because two Air Force guys on a hall pass for the weekend joined the party with a half bottle of Jack Daniel’s Honey Whisky. They just went for it with the pair of Japanese girls, doing their best to make conversation through a translation app on the phone.
The Korean American one at some made a comment to me about trying to keep his buddy out of trouble. So, when I noticed the airman was starting to drunkenly paw at one of the Japanese girls and she was receptive to his advances, I stepped in to cock block him. I merely conveyed to her that he had a wife so she could make her own decision. Ironically, not long later, I noticed the Korean American airman and the other Japanese girl come back in about 40 seconds apart and it occurred to me that they had both been gone for some while. I didn’t get the age of these two girls, but it would be fair to assume they are in their early 20s, and I know the two airmen were slightly older than me.
One by one, everyone went off to bed and I got stuck polishing off the Jack with one of the airmen until 2 or 3 in the morning.
I had a hangover the next morning for sure. I had talked to the two airmen about going to a sauna and when they stumbled down during the breakfast time, we confirmed our intentions to recuperate with hydrotherapy. Busan has some hot springs in the north and one of the many hotels in the “hot spring village” purports to be the largest in Asia. I went on my last visit and I’ve been itching to go again. Unfortunately, when I piled into a cab with the two airmen and another random Korean guy, they wanted to go to one in a downtown shopping mall. Spaland certainly covered the bases in the sauna area and had a very impressive jjimjilbang (the section where you roam about in pajamas). I got stuck in the front of the cab, which is the universal sign that I had to pay. It wasn’t much (as in it would have basically been a dollar each) and I drank a lot of free alcohol the night before, so I tried not to let it bother me. (If the roles were reversed I would offer a 1000 won note).
While I was still going through my cold tub/steam bath routine, I noticed that all three guys had disappeared. That’s odd, they all just left without saying anything. I finished up and headed into the public section, where I found them without really looking for them. I tried to take a nap on reclining easy chair in the relaxation room, but couldn’t quite fall asleep. Around noon, one of them got hungry and they collectively decided to leave the sauna for lunch. Considering how gd expensive the place was, I wasn’t really keen to make such a short stay, but I did have a video game tournament I could go to in the afternoon.
I took my leave of them and hopped on the subway to go to HQ Bar in Gwananli. I swear everyone on my subway car looked like a supermodel. I’m thinking a switch has been flipped in my head. How have I been here over a month with my head in the lofty clouds not noticing how insanely beautiful Korean women are? Walking down to the beach from the subway station, it looked like I had enough time to grab a lunch first, so when I passed a place serving oxbone soup, I popped in. Everyone in the place turned to look at me as I walked in. Even the restaurant had quite a few beautiful women in it. This is definitely the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon at work. I found my eyes kept wandering over
I rocked into HQ Bar at 2pm to find it not very crowded. I ordered a Coke and played a few warm up games of Ultimate Smash Bros. I couldn’t believe the turnout, 24 people competed and there were easily close 40 people in the bar all afternoon. A lot of people brought their own Nintendo Switches and controllers. Entrance was free, so I was happy to just not be the worst player, and considering I only had maybe two weeks of “training” in Beijing (shout out to Bearguy), I am satisfied with my performance. I squeaked out a close win in the first round of eliminations, and even though I lost the second round I did get one KO in.
I chatted with quite a few people over the four hours I was there, and though a lot of people looked really familiar (from pub quiz), I couldn’t be sure. I feel like my years in Beijing have made prejudiced against English teachers, as if it is a dirty word. It seems like a decent profession in Korea. One guy I was talking to actually had a teaching degree so its not like stereotype of fresh college graduates taking one or two years to goof off overseas. I eventually ordered a beer and then another one with a double cheeseburger. It was expensive, but hot damn, it was good.
The rain seemed to have finally tapered off so I walked back to the hostel from the bar during what would have been sunset if not for the thick cloud cover. I did my best to hydrate and stay awake until a reasonable hour to go to sleep.
| Lunch (Set meal with fish cake soup) | 6000 |
| Cookie (with free coffee) | 1000 |
| Starbucks | 10100 |
| Day 41 Subtotal: | 17100 |
| Cab | 4900 |
| Spaland (adult, weekend price) | 18000 |
| Beef soup | 6000 |
| Coke | 3000 |
| Beers | 8000 |
| Double Cheeseburger | 15000 |
| Day 42 Subtotal: | 54900 |
| Total: | 72000 W (435.6 RMB) (USD 64.78) |
Running Total: 9810 RMB (USD 1459)
Daily Average: 233.5 RMB (USD 34.7)